


Coast to coast

by SandyGuts



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst and Feels, Ben lives in Manhattan, Cheating, Dream Sex, Enemies to Friends, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, Finger Sucking, Fingerfucking, Force Bond (Star Wars), My First Work in This Fandom, Nice Armitage Hux, Oral Sex, Poe Dameron - Freeform, Pop Culture, Rey lives in San Francisco, Sexual Tension, Shameless Smut, The kinda hate each other, Unresolved Sexual Tension, finn - Freeform, the angst is real
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-21
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2019-11-01 16:04:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 41,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17870375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SandyGuts/pseuds/SandyGuts
Summary: Rey lives in San Francisco, where she works as an engineer for a tech company. She recently moved in with her boyfriend Poe, but she's been thinking about somebody else.Ben lives in New York, overseeing his own financial team in a high-end Manhattan office. He comes and goes as he pleases. He's single, but far from lonely.They are connected through a bond neither of them can explain or control.They annoy the hell out of each other, but annoyance soon turns into something else.Rey has been dreaming of Ben and now thinks of him in ways she had not before. He has always wanted her, but thinks nothing will ever happen between the two.Maybe he's wrong.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi there!
> 
> Thanks for stopping by! Hope you like what you read. 
> 
> Just so you know... 
> 
> \- This is my first and only fanfiction ever! Be gentle :)  
> \- This fanfic is not aimed at being accurate to the Star Wars characters -- I'm borrowing things as I go along, but you should know there may be times in which they differ from the new trilogy.  
> \- If you like what you read, please leave me a comment! Love is free <3

Hunched over the sink, her hands cupped together, she waited until a tiny pond of water formed and washed her face. She stood up, opened her eyes and looked at herself in the mirror. This could not be happening again.

She turned off the bathroom light and on her way to the kitchen, she peaked at her bedroom. He was still there, still sleeping. All her tossing and turning had not awakened him. But then again, he was a deep sleeper—she could have been jumping on the bed and still, he would be breathing heavy, his mouth half opened. As she was leaving, she noticed the clock on her nightstand. It marked 4:57 am.

Everything in the apartment was still and quiet, the only light coming through the big windows overlooking the street. She opened the refrigerator to look for something to drink but realized the cool air in her legs felt better than any beverage. She was still flustered from that dream, still feeling the sweat on her lower back, on her armpits and even between her thighs. She stood there for a minute, bashing on the icy breeze and thinking how nice it was, when her mind suddenly drifted to that pamphlet Poe had brought home back from Whole Foods the other day—the one with the whales and the images of thin and decrepit polar bears in the Arctic looking for food.

Drinking would be fine.

She poured herself a glass of water and walked to the window. She always found calm in watching people walk by; in the sounds cars made when running over a puddle, and in the twinkling lights of planes cruising through the sky. She stood there for a second and had a gulp of water.

"Awake at this hour?"

Her throat closed down and water came shooting from her pursed lips. She blinked and all of a sudden she—dressed in her pajama shorts and a ragged old shirt, hair knotted in a messy bun—was standing inside of a crowded train car. To her left, Ben stood comfortably in a little nook, leaning against the map of the New York City subway. He was wearing a black t-shirt, dark jeans, and leather boots. He had a hand in his pocket and a smirk on his face. Clearly, her spitting out water in the middle of her living room seemed like a funny scene to him.

"Fuck! You startled me," she said in a whispered scream. "What are you doing here? I thought we were not doing this anymore."

She blinked again and she was back in San Francisco, a thin line of light suddenly making its way into the horizon. Soon the sun would come up.

Ben was now leaning on his shoulder against the wall of her living room, beside the window. He looked cocky as ever—amused by an inside joke she would never get.

"I know, but you know as well I do I can't control this," he said matter of factly. "Neither can you."

She frowned, the light from the street reflecting on her face.

"Yeah, I just thought this whole thing had stopped. Since it had not happened for..."

"What? Four months now?"

 _Next stop 72nd Street. Stand clear of the closing doors, please_.

"I think so, yes," she said seeing the 79th Street station become a speeding blur. "Why is this happening again?" she blurted out, turning to him.

"I don't know. Were you thinking of me?" he asked in his husky voice.

"Of course not!" she shouted, offended.

Realizing her sudden outburst, she winced and quickly tiptoed to the hallway and peeked into the room. Poe had shuffled but was still asleep.

She had lied of course. She had been thinking about him—or at least her subconscious had. It started three weeks ago, one night after she and Poe had gone to Rose's birthday party downtown. They had come back home a little drunk and started having sex. There, straddling Poe, his hands on her hips while she was moving back and forward, she closed her eyes and saw Ben. To her surprise, even before she had time to ask herself why she thought of him, she decided to go along with it.

He was a quirky looking guy, with prominent features, a big nose, and thick lips. He was not what you would describe as "beautiful," but there was something about him that made her nervous in the best of ways. Maybe it was the scar on his face or that black mane of hair. Maybe it was the fact that he was tall and broad-shouldered, his hands looking like they could lift her and sit her on the kitchen counter in one swift move—the kind of hands that would sting a little bit if they ever got to slap her in the ass.

The images came to her mind and repeated themselves in short, slow motion GIFs—

That time he had looked up at her without even raising his head.

The way his hair bounced when he walked away.

How his arms bent when he put his hands in his back pockets.

The glimpse of his chest and collarbone that time he scratched his shoulder through the neck of his unbuttoned shirt.

The way he opened and closed his fists repeatedly when he was tense.

As she was thinking about his hands playfully smacking her, she felt her core stiffen and a burst of unleashed energy starting to make its way through her thighs, down her legs and back again.

She came loudly and spectacularly.

Thinking he was the source of her pleasure, Poe smirked and watched Rey's tits bounce slower as she came, finally being able to stop holding on and come himself. When they both had finished, he kissed her lips one last time and fell asleep. Rey, despite being showered with guilt and questions—why had Ben popped up in her head all of a sudden?— turned over and found some sleep as well. That night she dreamt of Ben's hands. The next morning she touched herself in the shower.

"You're lying," said Ben with a scoff. _Next stop is 66th Street - Lincoln Center. Stand clear of the closing doors, please_. "You always forget I can feel what you feel, and right now you're nervous."

"Of course I'm nervous! I don't want to wake Poe with your bullshit," she said coming back to the living room.

He laughed, shifted his weight and looked at his phone. "No," he said without taking his eyes off the screen. "You're nervous because I caught you."

She frowned and tried to think of another explanation, but before she could, he looked up, put his phone in his pocket and got off the train.

"That's OK. I've been thinking about you too," he said calmly as he walked through the platform and towards the stairs. Rey froze in place and felt the humid air of the New York subway on her skin, as people bumped her shoulders while making their way through. As Ben was walking away, she realized she had not moved and walked quickly to catch up. She was suddenly conscious of the black spots of gum stuck to the floor, the smell of piss, and the fact that she was not wearing any shoes. She tried to put that thought aside.

"You have?" she asked in an offended tone as they emerged into the corner of 66th and Broadway. "Why were you thinking about me?"

He was walking fast, looking forward, his strides long. She was almost running to catch up to him.

"Don't say it like that—don't pretend you don't like it," he said glancing at her from the side of his dark eyes, his lips pulling at the corner of his mouth.

"I don't like it as a matter of fact," she said looking straight. "I don't know why a guy like you would be thinking of me when we've got nothing in common and I live all the way across the country. I mean, seriously, what could you be possibly be thinking about me?" she scowled.

"Wouldn't you like to know..." he said smirking as he went inside a glossy looking building, the outside covered in steel and glass.

She stood there motionless, a rock in a constant stream of new yorkers in their morning commute. "I don't, actually," she said to herself and turned around. She was back in her apartment, back in San Francisco. The sun was coming up.

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

The sound of Poe moaning in his sleep coming from the bedroom brought her back. She figured he had noticed she was gone and would fully wake up in a minute. She finished her glass of water and went back to bed.

 

"Baby?" he muttered half asleep.

 

"Hi, I'm here," she whispered pulling over the covers.

 

"Are you having trouble sleeping again?"

 

"No, I just went for a glass of water," she lied for the second time that morning.

 

"Mmm hmm," he said rolling to face her and, with his eyes still closed, he opened his arms to hold her. She put her head down, trying once again to find that elusive sweet spot between his chest and his shoulder that seemed to be made just for her. So far, she had not found it, so she always had to settle. He put his arms around her and entangled his legs with hers. "Try to get some sleep. The alarm will go off soon," he said. He kissed the top of her head.

 

There, feeling Poe's chest going up and down, she became jealous of how easily he could go back to sleep. Ben's sudden apparition had left her shaken and though she tried not to think about it, whenever she closed her eyes she saw him there, leaning on his shoulder, looking back at her, a smirk on his face. Sleep eluded her all night, and as she was laying there, she thought she heard the silent typing of a laptop coming from the other side of the room. She refused to acknowledge it and kept her eyes closed, but the air had shifted and she knew he was there again. She could feel his eyes rolling to the sight of her and Poe sleeping.

 

* * *

 

 

He didn't know why it had stopped but he guessed it had something to do with Rey moving in with Dameron. Since they started dating, she had begun to put more and more effort into ignoring him whenever the bond brought them together. He didn't like it at first—who enjoys being explicitly ignored?—but eventually made his peace with it. The time between each encounter became longer, every visit a little shorter, her feelings a little dimmer.

 

One day, the encounters stopped completely. He was starting to wonder if it would happen eventually—the breakage of the bond. He had to witness somebody else's relationship and it was starting to get annoying. Especially since he knew—he felt it—she was not as convinced about it as she thought she was.

 

When Dameron asked her to move in together, Ben had been there. He could feel her hesitating from across the room, sitting at a table by the window of that Castro café. He had opened his eyes wide and looked in her direction, hoping she was still able to feel him. Their gazes met for the quickest of seconds just when Rey was about to look at Dameron in the eye and muter the word "Yes." That was the last time Ben had been to San Francisco.

 

But then again he had never really been to San Francisco. He had never wanted to. He had moved to New York a couple of years ago after his friend Hux had asked him to be his second in command at a new start-up he was working on. The company ended up becoming the next big thing and most of the team moved to California. Ben refused and asked to stay on the east coast.

 

Rumor has it he threatened to quit and Hux, knowing Ben was the main reason the company had reached success, convinced the board it was beneficial to keep a smaller operation in New York. Ben now worked on his own schedule, leading a small team of executives in charge of securing new investors. And since he was not a people person, he coordinated everything so he would not meet or talk to anyone unless absolutely necessary.

 

When Rey was trying to sleep, Ben had been at his desk, in his office overlooking Central Park. He could still feel her there, going on an emotional roller coaster that took her from confusion to guilt, to happiness, to nervousness and back, over and over again. The bond had returned stronger than ever and he would have loved to tease her about that, but knowing Dameron was there with her made him angry—though he didn't know exactly why.

 

Since the first time they connected, and beyond any of the technical possibilities the bond allowed, Ben had felt a special connection to Rey. More than asking why was this happening to him, the question was why was it happening with her. He started thinking there was some sort of instinct, something more primitive constantly trying to unite him with her and not anybody else, but he didn't know why. Just as he was thinking he was starting to figure it out, Rey started dating Dameron and all went down from there.

 

Seeing her in the train car this morning was the best thing that had happened to him in weeks. He had even taken his time to gaze at her naked legs and make out the outline of her waist through that worn out t-shirt she was wearing. Ben didn't know exactly how it was for Rey, but for him, the bond was as much physical as it was mental—not only his mind connecting with hers but also a physical force urging him to be near her, to touch her, to feel her. He suspected she sensed it too but thought he knew Rey good enough to assume that, if she did, she was pushing down those feelings in little boxes as hard as she could, and putting them away somewhere in her head.

 

That's why he liked teasing her. He would love to know what would happen if those boxes popped open all over the place.


	3. Chapter 3

"I'm sorry I'm late," apologized Rey, throwing her bag on her desk.

Finn glanced at her. She looked tired.

"Hubby came home drunk last night?" he said to the computer screen.

"That was one time! He went out with his friends and things got a little out of hand. It happens, Finn!" she said faking offense. She started laughing. "And he's not my husband!"

"He might as well be, hun. The train's leaving the station," said Finn smiling.

"Why the fuck do I even like you, Finn? Seriously!" she said finally sitting down. "Anyway, it's not that. It's the crazy dreams again."

Finally showing interest on what Rey was saying, Finn looked away from the screen, turned his chair to her and moved closer. "The sexy tall guy dreams?" he said teasingly.

"Yes, those dreams," said Rey opening her laptop. Of course, she had not told Finn the whole story. She specifically avoided mentioning the fact that the sexy tall guy was someone she actually knew and had a special connection with. She had let him believe it was a made up guy, a combination of exes and crushes that lingered on her subconscious and came to haunt her dreams at night.

"Tell me everything," Finn demanded.

"Is the same every time! I'm in my kitchen, he comes, we have a bit of a fight and then the energy shifts, we start kissing, he lifts me and sits me over the counter and we have stupid, amazing, bonkers sex," she said looking at her screen.

"DETAILS, REY! For the love of God, de-tails!" said Finn loudly, losing his patience.

"Lower your voice, Finn!" hushed Rey, standing up to see beyond her desk if somebody was listening. "Jesus, do you want to get me fired? The details are the same as ever and we've been over those. I just thought I was done with that, but why make things easier when they can be harder, right?"

"Yep, well, I'm going to say the same thing I told you when you first came up to me with this little problem of yours: therapy," Finn said rolling his chair back to his desk.

"And have some random guy tell me I have mommy issues and daddy issues and all of that?"

"Rey, you do have mommy issues and daddy issues and all of that," said Finn, this time in a sweet voice.

"I know that already! That's why I have you!" she laughed. "Anyway, I don't know, it's complicated..."

"What's complicated about dreams?"

"Everything!" said Rey closing her laptop and standing up. 

Finn followed her with his eyes as she walked down the hallway next to the rows of desks. He frowned and went back to work.

 

 

As she was striding to get to the conference room, Rey felt loud footsteps coming from behind. "Crap," she muttered to herself.

"So, you're having some interesting dreams." Ben had materialized by her side and now was walking with her, eyes straight ahead. Rey jumped, startled.

"You're listening to private conversations now! That's rich. There's something called privacy, Ben, don't know if you have ever heard of it..." said Rey, her eyes also looking forward.

"Again, I don't control this," said Ben annoyed. "And just so you know, I only heard Finn asking you about the dream thing, so your secret little musings are safe."

Rey kept quiet but shot an angry gaze at him from the corner of her eye. Her frown was creased, her jaw was jolted, her lower lip pouted. In his head, Ben felt the urge to violently grab her by the waist, pull her closer to him and bite that lip; to lick it, to suck on it. For a moment he could see it—her laptop would drop to the floor and he would kiss her aggressively against the cubicles, making a show for everyone there.

But he blinked and his mind went back to Rey's office. He was still walking beside her and her lip was still pout, but now she was staring at him, confused. From one moment to another, she felt different. Ben was annoying her, but was she angry? Why did she have the sudden urge to punch him in the face? She stopped walking.

"What are you so flustered about?" she asked.

The question caught him off guard and he kept on walking a foot away from her. Then he turned around to look at her, one hand on his hip, the other covering his mouth. He kept quiet for a moment and then started laughing.

"You know what? Nothing... nothing. It's nothing," he shrugged, turned around and walked away from her.

"What do you mean 'nothing'? You clearly are upset about something! I can feel it, you know? Tell me!" she shouted, following him down the hall.

"Don't you have a meeting to go to?" he said, not turning back.

She stopped in her tracks again.

"Crap," she whispered to herself. "This is not over, Ben Solo!" she shouted, but he was gone.

 

* * *

 

He opened his eyes and was pacing in his Manhattan office again. He was upset of course, but he didn't know how she was capable of feeling it again. So maybe the bond was indeed back and stronger than ever. That was news. But then again, why was he so upset? She annoyed him, that was certain. He hated Rey's self-righteousness, hated how she always tried to be so perfect, to keep her feelings, her opinions, her thoughts in line, not to ruffle any feathers. Why did she do that? Why did she care what anybody thought? But then again, why did he care? She frustrated him.

He walked towards the window overlooking Central Park and got a little bit closer. With his forehead against the glass that went from floor to ceiling, separating him from a 30 story abyss, Ben looked down to the street and suddenly felt out of balance. He froze in place and closed his eyes to work through vertigo, but behind his lids, all he could see was Rey's lower lip sticking out of her mouth in a pout. With his eyes still closed, he smiled and realized how quickly he could go from finding her an annoyance to wanting to slap her in the ass and fuck her from behind. She would never go for a thing like that, but it was sure nice to think about it. Still, against the window, he started to feel his jeans pressuring him to stay in place.

The outline of Rey's waist seen through that old shirt she called pajamas; her long legs in her skinny jeans; the loose strands of hair that framed her face; the little buns on her head, how easily he could grab them and pull...

A knock on the door.

One of the girls that worked at his office peeked her blonde head at the door and let him know Hux was on the line for him.

"I'll get back to him later," Ben said and, without turning around, swayed his arm. The door shut violently behind him.

Straightening up, he opened his eyes and looked down to his pants and realized he had created a situation he'd have to take care of. Minutes later, while he was stroking himself in the bathroom, he thought of the sound of Rey's ass crashing over and over again against his hips. He imagined her moaning and how her back would curve up if he grabbed one of her hair buns and pulled. With that image playing on a loop, he grabbed the sink tightly and shut his eyes tighter as he was coming. When he finished, he took a look at the mess he had made and then looked up to see his face in the mirror. With his clean hand, he pushed his hair back and laughed at the thought of jerking off to Rey. He wiped himself, cleaned the sink, zipped up his pants and went back to work.

 

 


	4. Chapter 4

It was around 11 pm when Ben opened the door to his apartment and found her sitting on the couch. It was strange to see her after all the things he had imagined doing to her that morning. It was either that or the fact that he was coming home from the house of a girl in Brooklyn who he had dinner and sex with after not being able to shake the images of Rey off his head. The girl didn't help that much though—there were no buns, no pout—but it was better than nothing, and at least he would be able to sleep that night. With her smell still on his fingers, he dropped his bag, took off his shoes at the entrance and walked straight to the kitchen to get a beer. He didn't even look at her. She was back to being an annoyance.

Rey didn't say anything either. She had just come home from work and was waiting for Poe, who was getting take out. Exhausted, she had kicked off her shoes, dropped her things in the middle of the living room and just laid on the couch for a moment with her eyes closed. When she opened them, she was in an apartment in Manhattan, the shades opened, the bricks bare. She was confused at first, mainly because Ben was nowhere in sight.

She got up and looked for him, hoping to find him doing something embarrassing—in the bathroom maybe, putting some fancy product on his hair—but all she found was a perfectly clean and tidy apartment. The kitchen was impeccable, the living room looked like the ones in lifestyle magazines. Even the bathroom was neat. It wasn't until she peeked into his room that she found a mess—the bed was unmade, the sheets tangled in knots, one pillow on the floor, the other one in the middle of everything. There were clothes laying all over the place, a shirt sliding from the foot of the bed, books piled up by his bedside table. She giggled. Rey thought Ben to be a clean, spotless guy. Peeking into his bedroom to find this felt not only like a well-deserved transgression but also like an invitation to look through the cracks of his armor.

She had picked up one of his shirts and sniffed it when she heard the keys in the door. She moved fast and went back to sit on the couch, his smell still in her nostrils. The shirt didn't smell of anything in particular—no perfume, none of those pungent manly deodorants—but had a delicious scent of skin, the kind that hits your nose when you're lying on the sand, the sun hitting your shoulders. A smell of sweat with a tiny kick—the smell of guy.

"Want a beer?" he finally said from the kitchen, startling her.

"What?" she replied suddenly out of her own thoughts.

"I said," he said appearing barefoot under the threshold separating the kitchen and the living room, a bottle in each hand. "Do you want a beer? I'm having one myself and you know what they say about drinking alone..." He was making a joke, but he was not laughing or even smiling. She felt uneasy.

"No, thanks. I'm having dinner soon. I don't want to ruin my appetite," she said.

He looked at her and went back to the kitchen, only to appear a minute later grabbing a bottle of beer by the neck, using only his thumb, his index and middle finger. Again, he walked past her without even looking at her, now towards the bedroom. When he came back, he walked into the living room and spread out on the couch across from her—his legs wide open, his left elbow hooked to the back of the couch. He still didn't say anything. He stared at her in silence, sipping from his beer now and then.

"I would leave you be," said Rey apologetically, feeling uncomfortable. "But there's nothing much I can do about it. I was hoping it had stopped by now but... I'm sorry."

Ben sipped his beer one more time and as he was swallowing, he looked down. "It's OK. I know you can't control this. You're not a bother, by the way, so don't apologize," he said resigned.

"Oh, thank you," she said, her cheeks flushing.

They sat there in silence, alternating between looking out the window, at the floor, at the ceiling.

"So, good old Dameron went for dinner, uh?"  Ben asked all of a sudden.

"Yes. We're having Vietnamese," said Rey proudly.

"Special occasion?" asked Ben, mockingly.

"No," replied Rey, not entirely sure of the irony in his voice. "Just a regular night; regular dinner."

"A regular life," said Ben sipping his beer again. Rey looked at him, flames in her eyes. He could feel the battle inside of her. She was angry because she knew what Ben was implying, but at the same time, she was struggling not to give in—not to let him know he had the power to get to her and piss her off so easily.

"Ben, what is your problem?" said Rey calmly, looking straight at him.

"Why would I have a problem?"

"I don't know, you tell me," she said and then paused. When she realized there would be no answer to that, she continued: "I know you don't like me that much, but do you have to be such an asshole?"

Ben raised his eyebrows. He knew Rey had an attitude but he didn't know she had a spine. He liked it.

"I'm not being an asshole, I'm just asking you about your dinner with Dameron, that's all," he said coyly.

"That's bullshit," she said, now losing her patience. "You don't like Poe and that's fine. You don't like me either but we've got this thing going on, so we might as well be civil about it," she said tense, her arms tightly crossed.

"This thing? What is 'this thing' exactly?"

"This!," she said raising her voice and opening her arms as to signal the apartment. "This! This bond, this... me sitting in your apartment in Manhattan while at the same time you're sitting in my couch all the way across the country! This, the dreams..." Rey opened her eyes, realizing what she had just said. She froze for a second, then quickly squared her shoulders and tried to control her feelings. But she knew it was too late.

"The dreams?" he asked leaning forward.

"Well, of course! You dream with the people you see and this is the third time I've stumbled into you today, so..." she tried.

"So you're dreaming about me. Is that what you were telling your friend at work today?" said Ben with a smug smile on his face.

"What? No, Ben. Please stop being so self-centered."

She tried to keep her cool, but she was starting to feel nervous and she knew that was the final blow. She was not a good liar—Poe said that all the time. But she had to try. She knew that if she failed to control herself, Ben would end up feeling her nervousness too and that would be the end of it.

He sat back with his eyes fixed on her. He crossed his legs and a smirk appeared on his face. Rey knew she had lost.

"Why are you so nervous, Rey?" he said enjoying every word.

"If I'm nervous is because I can't possibly understand why would this start again. We had it under control! It had stopped. But now it's back and not only it's back like before, but now I'm seeing you all the time and that's just... too annoying," she blurted out, leaning forward, her legs and arms crossed.

"No," he said, his lips pulled from the right. "You're nervous about something else."

He put the now empty beer bottle on the coffee table, taking his time, observing how Rey concentrated her tension in her crossed arms. Through her head, different scenarios and versions of reality were running one by one. She thought about what she'd say in each and every one of them, hoping to get out as unscathed as possible. As she was opening her mouth—to say something, anything,—Ben interrupted her.

"Well, if I were you and your dreams were anything like mine, I'd sure be nervous," he said suddenly, laying back.

Rey turned to meet his gaze in a swift and sudden move. This scenario had not occurred to her.

"Your dreams? What are you dreaming?" Rey asked. Ben sat silent and before he could respond, Rey remembered. She opened her eyes wide in realization.

"Does this have to do with you getting all fussed up today at my office?"

Ben had forgotten about that. He remembered the pout and everything that came after that, but he didn't remember Rey noticing something else was going through his head. Her pout. The kissing, the licking, the sucking, the biting...

Now he was growing nervous. He had not planned for things to reveal themselves so soon. He wanted to tease her a little bit—get her angry, see what she would do. But now the cat was out of the bag and, relishing in her new upper hand, Rey relaxed in the couch and put on her best smirk.

"You said you were thinking about me this morning. Then you get all worked up about who knows what at my office, and now you tell me you've been dreaming something that would make me nervous," she said. "Tell me, Ben, what is going on in that head of yours?"

Rey sat confidently thinking she was about to embarrass him. She didn't know exactly how, because she still could not imagine well enough what was she implying with all of this. She just saw a way out of that conversation and she took it. Now, what was she fishing for, she had no idea.

Ben sighed and decided there was no point in lying. He wanted her, but she'd never do anything about it. In the worst case scenario, she would retreat—start ignoring him as she did before and the bond would be cut. They'd gone through that before, and if this time was final, so be it. The bond was not supposed to be there anyway. He was willing to take his chance. He inhaled and as he leaned forward again, his elbows resting on his knees, he looked straight into her eyes.

"I think in some way you already know this," he started. "And if you don't, this may come as a shocker, but I think you're hot and I want you."

Rey was paralyzed. So much so, this time she didn't even try to conceal it. Her eyes were wide and the proud smirk was absolutely gone from her face.

"What...?" she managed to say after a moment.

"I want you," he said matter-of-factly, but as he saw Rey was not blinking, he continued: "I feel sexually attracted to you. Normally I wouldn't put it that way because it makes me sound like an idiot, but that's what it is, so... there you go," he said.

Rey was frozen. Her jaw dropped and suddenly she was unable to hold his gaze. A million questions popped up into her head, crowding her, numbing her limbs, clouding her sight. She was trying to figure out if this was a joke. Or maybe an invitation. To what, she didn't know, but the idea didn't sound terrible at all. Would she want it to be an invitation? Yes, she would, she thought. And suddenly, everything was a little clearer: the dreams, how much he infuriated her, that warm feeling that crept up her neck and into her cheeks whenever he appeared. Now that Ben had said it, there was no point in denying it for herself: she wanted him too. Badly. She had wanted him for a long time now and ignoring him when she moved in with Poe was the only way to try to make things work. It had been a relief when we disappeared for months—one less distraction, one less thing to worry about. But now he had come back and, as if the bond were trying to catch up, she wanted him more than ever. But she wasn't like him, she could have never said something like that straight up as he did. Plus, she was under the impression he didn't even like her. He's always so annoyed with her, so condescending. Of course he didn't like her. She was prepared to live pushing down her feelings forever—put them in boxes and bury them deep. But now a whole new world of possibility opened up for her, something she wasn't counting on. And then there was Poe. Why was he not enough for her? Why did she want to be touched by Ben, someone she's still not sure likes her, who lives across the country, and with whom she could not build anything?

Then she realized he was not talking about building anything. He said "I want you," not "I love you," not even "I like you." If this was an invitation, it wasn't to run away together and live happily ever after. This was something else—much more basic, much more simple and yet much, much more complicated.

Ben kept looking at her, his elbows on his knees, his fingers intertwined. He saw how her face melted completely upon his words and felt a relentless wave of emotions wash over her again and again. It was such a fast and complicated array, he just couldn't keep up. To him, it felt like a tingling numbness going all through his body. Her pupils were rapidly jerking from side to side.

"But you don't even like me," she said suddenly, a surprised but stiff expression on her face.

"No, I never said I didn't like you. I said you are annoying, which you are," he said and then paused. "I do like you, in fact. But you do realize that even though I like you, what I told you has nothing to do with that, right?" he said slowly, so as to not overwhelm her.

"Right, yes, of course," she said snapping out of her trance.

"Frankly, I don't know if this information is of any use to you, but I feel that somehow, you already knew this and, more than that... I think you even like it," he said.

"Wait, what...?" she went back to her confused mode.

"Come on, Rey!" said Ben smugly, lying back against the couch. "This sexual tension we have... you like it. Don't say you don't."

"You mean this? Arguing and getting in each other's nerves? You make me feel like a nuisance every time you see me! You call that 'sexual tension'?!" she said a little offended by how he assumed he knew everything that went through her head.

"Well, yes! And it's fun! I mean, don't get me wrong, you're annoying and sometimes I do think you're a nuisance..."

"Thank you!" she yelled.

"...But to you, I'm all of those things too! We make each other mad, but that's how it's supposed to be! It makes me want to slap you, but it also makes me want to sleep with you," he said laughing.

Rey looked horrified, but mostly she was confused. She imagined all that she could do just by saying 'Yes,' but then she felt guilty. Poe would be home with dinner soon and here she was, thinking of jumping to Ben Solo's lap and have him rip off her shirt.

Her thoughts were interrupted by his voice.

"And you want me too... admit it."

This was not said as a question or even an assumption. Ben looked at her straight in the eye and stated it as fact. That tingling numbness he had felt coming from her before was now dissipating into clearer feelings. She was angry.

"What the fuck are you saying, Ben...?" she jumped to her feet in outrage.

"I can feel it! You want me too!" he said with a smirk. He was standing up now, towering over her.

"I do not want you, Ben Solo. I'm only here because I'm apparently stuck in this fucking bond thing with you," she blurted out. She couldn't believe his audacity, the nerve to tell her how she felt. Being right didn't mean he could be a jerk to her. For the moment, she sure was not going to let him know the former, but she sure was going to make the latter clear. "I've been perfectly happy all this time since you disappeared and, actually, I don't know why the fuck you had to come back. I don't need you to come here and tell me how I feel just because you think this... _bond_ gives you the slightest insight into what goes through my head. You don't know. You don't know shit. You just come and go and piss me off. That's the extent of our bond, so stop being a condescending prick trying to educate me about myself. Do us both a favor and fuck off!"

This she said inches from his face, her body stiff, her fists clenched tight. He stood there listening patiently, the laughter gone. Once she was done, he lashed out:

"You know what? Just because you don't want to admit your feelings doesn't make me a prick. You know that this thing between you and me is more than just appearing and disappearing. I don't like it any more than you do, but at least I'm being honest about it—I'm not a coward, I deal with it. I'm sorry if you feel offended by all of this, but unlike you, I don't go around life thinking I might step into somebody's toes. I couldn't give less of a shit about that! You go ahead and live your boring ass life with Dameron—live in denial all you want. Sooner or later you'll have to face what you really feel and take responsibility for it. In the meantime, stay the fuck away from me, see if this bond finally breaks!"

Rey was boiling with rage. As she looked up at him, her brow furrowed. She gritted her teeth and in a low voice said: "Yeah, I hope so too."

As if it would make a difference, she went towards the entrance, opened the front door and slammed it shut as she left. The connection was still there, but she couldn't stand to see his face anymore, so putting something between the two seemed like a good idea. She heard the noise of his beer bottle hitting something in the trash can and sat on the floor, her back to the wall. She tried hard to calm herself, close her eyes—inhaled slowly, exhaled loudly. 

"What are you doing here?" said Poe, two bags of take-out in one hand, his keys in the other.

Rey looked up, her anger starting to wash away by the sight of him.

"I locked myself out," she said reaching her hands so he could help her up. "I heard something in the hallway and when I came out to see what it was, a breeze shut the door closed. I didn't have my phone with me but since you were coming, I decided to wait."

That was the third time she had lied that day.

Poe helped her up and gave her a peck on the lips. As he was opening the front door, he told her about this couple he had heard fighting on his way over. "She sounded pissed," he said. Rey laughed.

When they entered the apartment, Poe saw all the windows were shut.


	5. Chapter 5

"You wanna get some lunch?" Finn said, bursting the bubble of her own thoughts. She noticed the time and how the office was starting to look a little empty.

"Sure," she said. "Should we go to the cafeteria...?"

"Nah," Finn said shaking his head. "Let's go somewhere else. I need to get away from these people. Even if it is just for an hour a day."

Rey closed her laptop, picked up her bag and automatically walked with Finn towards the elevator. He was rambling about something that happened in an earlier meeting. Something about a client asking for some impossible thing, and him having to play it cool while the boss nodded. She looked at him every now and then. Said "Aha," whenever Finn turned to her looking for some acknowledgment. He noticed this of course but said nothing. Not yet. 

They walked for a while and they finally sat at the terrace of a café, a couple of blocks away from their office building. The sun was warm, the breeze was nice. They were almost in downtown San Francisco, in one of those blocks that seems to be the fringe of chaos and the first sprout of residential bliss.

A waiter came, poured water into their glasses and asked for their order. She chose something randomly from the menu. Some soup maybe? She didn't care. She wasn't that hungry after all. Finn ordered something too. She didn't know what. He kept rambling until he finally shut up.

"You seem a little off. Are you OK?" he said finally, his eyebrows meeting at the center of his forehead.

"Sure! What do you mean?" she said, trying to play it cool.

"Well, I've been meaning to ask you for some time now. At first, I thought you were tired or maybe you had fought with Poe and didn't want to mention it. I thought it would fade, but it hasn't. You don't look well..." he said.

She feigned offense.

"Thank you, I really appreciate that..." she said laughing a bit.

"No," he smiled. "That's not what I mean." He looked over his shoulder to check if anybody they knew was around. "I don't know, you seem a little distracted lately. I know you're swamped with work and everything..."

"I know, right?" she interrupted him.

"Yes, but you do know why that is, right?" he said looking straight to her while he picked up his glass of water.

"There's just too much to do around the office, I guess..." she said sheepishly.

"No. It's because you've been offering to assist everyone in everything. I mean, these people are not paying me enough to do my own work, let alone help with anybody else's!" said Finn lying back on his chair, taking a sip of water. "And yet you're volunteering for everything!"

"Oh, you mean Rose's project..." she finally said, as if she understood what was going on.

"No," said Finn lowering his glass, his eyes looking straight at her. "It's not only Rose. It's everyone. You're taking a lot of extra work and it seems to be taking a toll on you," he said worriedly. "You're going home late, you're coming in early. I can tell you're not getting much sleep... I mean, I'm sorry, but that concealer under your eyes doesn't fool me."

Rey blushed, a little self-conscious. She had spent a fair amount of money on that concealer. The girl at the store had taught her to apply it and everything. She really thought she was doing a good job with it. But then again, she has never been a makeup kind of girl.

"Is something going on with you?" he asked worried and paused. "Blink twice if you're in danger..." he said to end the drama. He laughed.

Rey laughed along with him. She took a sip from her glass of water thinking he was right. Maybe she was spreading herself just a little too thin. Ever since that night when she fought with Ben, she's been trying to distract herself. Getting as much work as she could was her way of doing just that. It was easier than thinking or talking about it, mainly because she wasn't sure how to feel about it, or even begin to express it. How could she explain the bond to someone else without sounding absolutely crazy?

She thought after a few days he would appear out of nowhere. She would act annoyed, they would bicker a little bit and then she would tell him that she was sorry. That she didn't need to react that way, that she was angry. Hopefully, he would apologize too. And hopefully, they could have an adult conversation about what happened that night at his apartment. But the days went by and there was no sign of Ben. Whenever she felt unstable, on the verge of blinking herself across the country, she would open her eyes and she would be standing exactly where she was the moment before. This realization always came with disappointment.

After a couple of weeks passed she gave up on the bond. She thought maybe it was time for her to take matters into her own hands—if not to apologize, at least to get it over with and stop thinking about him. A simple web search would result in a couple of photos of him—mainly mentions of his name in the press, pictures of Hux shaking hands with several guys, looking important.

She eventually stumbled upon his Facebook page. She clicked hoping to get more information from it. Maybe she'll even have something to casually mention and start up a conversation. But it was only a photo of him and even then, she could not make up his face. There were no likes, no comments, no pictures of hot ex-girlfriends he had forgotten to delete. No information that gave him away. Nothing. Just that picture of him, contrasted by light, looking away from the camera. Her mouse had hovered over the "Add Friend" button for a minute or two. Maybe this could be the start of something more normal—of a friendship based upon something other than weird bonds that took her to New York against her will every other day. But just when she was about to click, she panicked and closed the tab. A dark thought crossed her mind like a shadow. The fear of him not responding crippled her.

That day she decided there was nothing to be done, so she just dedicated herself to keep busy. She was resigned to not knowing how that story could have ended, leaving her mostly disappointed. It had been a long time since something like that happened to her—the vertigo of standing in the verge of a cliff filled with exciting possibility, waiting for her to let go and jump.

That's how she felt when she first met Poe—cute guy, smart, good with words, endearingly smug. But also a little dull. Sometimes too smart for his own good—or at least that's what he thought. But he liked her and she liked him, and that warm feeling of being loved by somebody felt too good to pass on.

She remembers Ben rolling his eyes to the back of his head whenever Poe jumped out of his seat and ran in Rey's direction when she came into a bar. Or how he would scoff whenever Poe told a story, always surrounded by people listening, absolutely fascinated. In those moments, even though she smiled, Rey was not impressed. Her eyes would be constantly running off to find Ben at the back of the room, reaffirming a fear that had crept into her gut the first moment Poe Dameron held her hand. That's why she had to ignore him. If she wanted things to work, she would have to make them work. And Poe was a guy worth working for.

"Rey?" said Finn raising his eyebrows.

"I'm sorry! I was out of it... you were saying?"

Finn scoffed. "I said 'Are you OK?' I worry about you, you know."

"Thank you, Finn. I really appreciate it. I know I've been a little off lately. I have a lot on my mind these days and burying myself in work seemed like a good idea. Don't you ever get tired of just... thinking?"

"Yeah, sure. All the time. Just imagine how much I think! A genius like me..."

They laughed. Then there was silence.

"Is it Poe?" Finn asked intrigued. Rey opened her eyes wide in surprise and froze in place. Not knowing what to answer, she was finally saved by the waiter who was back with their food. She looked at the plate he put in front of Finn—an elaborate salad with cheese and cranberries. It looked delicious. Then the waiter put a bowl with a depressing grey mushroom soup in front of her. She didn't even remember ordering it and regretted not paying attention to the menu earlier. She decided she would starve.

"No... or maybe, I don't know," Rey said looking down, stirring the soup, frowning at the pieces of mushroom floating on top.

"What do you mean you don't know?" Finn's eyes narrowed.

"No, I do know. But it's complicated!" she said, a whining expression on her face.

"But is it Poe? Is he being a jerk?"

"No, he's not being a jerk and it doesn't have to do with him, but a little..."

Finn already looked exhausted. He inhaled and exhaled to control himself and started all over.

"OK, so maybe it has to do with Poe but only in a tangential way..." he ventured.

"Yes, something like that!" said Rey. Finn started eating and looked at Rey in silence, waiting on her to get the cue and start talking. A couple of minutes passed and Finn was still waiting on Rey to open her mouth.

What he didn't know, was that once she opened it, there would be no shutting her up.

Rey bit her lip in doubt. But before she could think the consequences thoroughly, the words came pouring out of her mouth. 

"There's this guy..." she started. Finn froze and screamed internally. If he hadn't had his mouth full of lettuce and cranberries, the scream would have sure been external. He tried to hide his excitement and nodded so she would continue: "I've known him for some time now. We bump into each other from time to time, but I wouldn't call him a friend... maybe an acquaintance?" she shrugged.

As she was saying this, she reminded herself that talking could be a good idea. She could finally run everything by somebody else, hoping she wouldn't feel as crazy as she had been feeling the past few weeks. Well, she wouldn't tell him everything that had happened. She would save some of the details for herself—she wouldn't mention the bond or confess her dreams were about Ben. She wouldn't even dare to say his name.

"And?!" Finn said, his mouth full, his eyes wide, a fork full of lettuce waiting on him to swallow.

"Well, I hadn't seen him in a while and it was good, though sometimes I thought about him and wondered what was he doing. But it's not like I have his number or I'm friends with him on Facebook. We're not that kind of acquaintances, you know what I mean?" Rey said matter-of-factly.

Finn nodded.

"Well, there's always been this weird vibe between the two of us. It's not like I like him-like him, but something about him has always intrigued me. To be honest I thought that, for the most part, he didn't even like _me —_that he was being polite, but it turns out he was just... cold, I guess" she took a spoonful of her soup and brought her to her lips, immediately regretting it. 

Finn looked like he was on the brink of an aneurysm, stuffing food up to his mouth as a way to release stress. He had almost finished his salad by now and was now compulsively drinking and refilling his glass of water. "AND?!" he said exasperated.

"As I told you, I had not seen him in a while and then I suddenly bumped into him a couple of weeks ago and he... he... he looked fine. And I mean _fine_ ," said Rey rolling her eyes, almost smiling.

Finn felt his face flood with blood, suddenly hot. He gestured the waiter to bring another bottle of water.

"And things... started happening..."

Finn could not take it anymore. 

"OH MY GOD REY, DID YOU CHEAT ON POE?!" Finn suddenly exploded. A couple at the next table turned around and eyed her. A woman three tables down looked at her with judging eyes. The waiter giggled. As soon as he realized what he had caused, Finn covered his mouth in embarrassment. Rey jolted her jaw and opened her eyes wide, disapproving. Finn muttered "Sorry" and made the gesture of sealing his lips.

Once the people who had responded to Finn's loud reaction had gone back to their own business, Rey resumed.

"No. I didn't cheat on Poe..." she said in a calm whisper. "Or at least I haven't."

This was too much for him to bear. Finn had never imagined having this conversation with Rey today. When he asked her to go to lunch, he thought it would be something trivial keeping her down. Or maybe something about her parents or that terrible childhood she sometimes mentions over the fourth glass of wine. This? This was new, and unexpected, and totally off character for her. And he loved it.

"What do you mean not yet?" he asked, trying to control his excitement.

"Well, we bumped into each other the other day and started talking, and one thing led to another and he ended up telling me he feels attracted to me." Rey couldn't believe Finn's eyes could get any wider, but they did.

"OK, so wait... he just came out like that? Does he know you have a boyfriend?"

"Yeah, he does. And here's the other part—what confuses me a lot," she said and then took a long gulp of water, relishing on what suspense did to Finn's features, seeming to melt with impatience. "is that he said he felt attracted to me—no, wait... he said  _he wanted me —_but he made it clear that that's all that it was. Something purely..."

"Sexual," Finn blurted out, the couple in the table next to them eyeing again.

"Yes. That," Rey said nodding.

"Oh my God..." said Finn to himself. His eyes drifted while he processed all of this. Rey looked at him resigned, nibbling a piece of toast. Suddenly his brow furrowed and his eyes turned to her again. "Wait... but, what did you say?"

"I went into shock. And then we actually ended up having this huge fight because he was all 'Oh, you're attracted to me, admit it,' and I got furious because who the hell does he think he is telling me how I feel, right?" she said crossing her arms.

"Yeah, but do you, though?" Finn asked immediately. "I mean, do you like him?"

Rey froze for a second. She looked at the buildings down the block, absent, trying to find the answer for that question. She took her time.

"Well, that's the thing. I'm with Poe and he's great. We have our issues, but nothing beyond what any couple deals with," she said and then paused to bite her lip. "But this guy... he's like white noise. Like when you're driving in the middle of nowhere and there are no radio stations to tune into. And suddenly you get a signal, but it's never perfect. And it's always there, that white noise," she paused, her eyes fixed on Finn's. "He's an app running in the background of my head that I don't know how to shut down. He's..." she inhaled deeply. "I just can't shake him off."

"Oh... he's got you," Finn said nodding.

Rey pondered Finn's words. When she realized she agreed, a dread started forming in the depth of her stomach.

"I mean, a little bit... maybe?" she cringed. "It's just that I'm not entirely sure what is it that I feel for him. Sometimes I think it's just something sexual, something I want and have to get off my chest and be done with it. But sometimes I'm not that sure..." she said surprised of the words coming out of her mouth.

"And what about Poe?" Finn said.

"That's the tricky part! I don't want to break up with him, but sometimes, when I think it's only something I have to get off my chest, then I think maybe I should do it and move on with my life. But even that's not fair to him. He deserves better..." she suddenly slouched and the light in her eyes dimmed. "I just don't want to fuck it all up, you know?"

"Mmm..." Finn's brow was furrowed and his gaze was lost in his empty plate. He seemed to be processing all of what he'd heard so far and come up with a verdict. But before he could open his mouth, Rey jolted in her seat and put her hand over his. Her eyes were pleading and full of shame.

"Finn, I know you're also friends with Poe and I'm so sorry to have put you in this position but, for the love of God, you CANNOT tell him ANYTHING about this. Please, promise you won't!" she looked desperate.

"Oh, honey... of course. Not a word to Poe," he put his other hand on top of hers. "But I will tell you, this is tricky shit and whatever you do, you might want to think about it really hard so you don't mess up," he said, his face full of understanding.

He paused.

"So, wait, is it really necessary to do anything at all? I mean, you don't text, and you don't see him on a daily basis. Couldn't you just ignore him and let it all be over? Eventually, he'll stop being white noise."

"Well, I'm pretty sure I'm gonna be running into him a lot."

"Why? Does he live in your building or something?" Finn asked intrigued.

Rey inhaled deeply, trying to find a way to explain this without mentioning the fact that Ben appeared out of nowhere even though he lived in another time zone. "No, but something like that. Let's just say I can guarantee you that, as soon as I let my guard down, he'll appear and wreck my sanity. It has always worked like that. I know it," she said resigned.

Finn thought about it for a moment and then looked at her straight in the eye.

"You're considering it, don't you?" he said, a little smile forming in the corner of his mouth.

"What?" Rey said feigning offense.

"Sleeping with him! That's a real possibility—not some indecent proposition from a guy you bump into from time to time. You're actually considering putting your relationship on the line and see if you can get away with it!" Finn said matter-of-factly.

Finn was right. She was considering it. Or maybe she had already decided she would do it if the opportunity arose. She wanted to do it but she also had to find some way around it—a way in which Poe didn't get damaged and things could go back to normal as soon as possible afterward. But that was a long shot and she knew it.

"Oh my God!" said Rey finally, exasperated. "I'm the worst person in the world! I know that, but I tried to ignore it. I truly did! I spent over four months avoiding him and looking away whenever I saw him," she shrugged and smiled sarcastically. "And yet here we are again!"

She covered her face with her hands and shook her head. "I'm horrible Finn, I know..." she said, her words muffled by her palms.

Finn looked at her, thinking. Then he sat back on his chair. "You're not a horrible person, Rey," he said very calmly. Rey's head jolted upwards, and with her brow furrowed, she looked at Finn, confused. "You're human. These things happen. And yes, maybe it doesn't have to do entirely with Poe, but something there must not be working properly for you to get so distracted by this guy."

"Well... I guess..." Rey said.

Finn stared at something way beyond Rey. A minute passed and then he returned his gaze to her, intently. Finn's final verdict was in.

"I believe you should do it," he said, his lower lip pouted.

Rey's eyes shot open. She sat up on her chair, her elbows on the table, her nostrils flared. She looked at him and finally said: "Wait, what?"

"I think you should do it. Get it out of your system. If this guy is nothing else than a hormonal revolution for you, which apparently he is, then get it over with and continue on with your life. Poe doesn't have to know. Sex is sex. As long as it stays that way and it's a one-time thing, I don't see why you'd have to sacrifice everything for it," he said matter-of-factly.

"My God, you're evolved..." Rey said still shocked. She was impressed by Finn's reaction. It made sense but somehow it still didn't feel right to her. Was she being a prude or was she questioning her rejection because she actually wanted this to happen?

Then she remembered Ben's face when she stormed out of his apartment. His dark eyes piercing, his nostrils flared. His face was not contorted with anger, but his words were filled with disdain. There was no way this was happening now. 

"Maybe you're right," she finally said to Finn. "But anyway... I'm sure he hates me right now, so there's no reason to be having this conversation. The point is absolutely moot."

"If he lives in your building or around your building or whatever, it may be moot now, but eventually you will see him," Finn said correcting her. "Maybe it's a good thing he disappeared—it gives you time to get your thoughts and feelings together, so whenever you run into him again, you'll know exactly what to do."

Rey rested her head on her hand, her elbow on the table. She replayed Finn's words in her head and thought it made total sense. Maybe Ben's absence was the bond's way of telling her to take five, regroup, plan ahead. If things kept at the pace they were going, she realized, she still had time. This gave her a sense of relief she had not known since the fight at Ben's apartment and it washed over her like a cold shower in the middle of summer. She smiled at Finn.

"Thank you, Finn. It's been great to finally talk to someone about this. You've been really helpful."

"I'm glad to be of service," he said playfully taking a bow. "But I have a final piece of advice to give you: if push comes to shove, and you decide to embark on this little adventure of yours—details of which you will share with me at large, by the way, no buts about that," he said, not a hint of irony in his voice, "you do have to know that sex is an entry level drug to more powerful experiences," he paused and looked at her intently, making sure her mind was not drifting anywhere.

"Some people have a hard time knowing where the line is between sex and love, and not because of lack of experience, but because most of the times, that line is blurry." Rey kept looking at him, concentrated, narrowing her eyes. "If you are sure that what you feel about this guy is entirely hormonal, go ahead and play; get it over with. But if for only one second you think you might be feeling something else, even the slightest feeling of care beyond what you would care for any other human being walking down the street, then you'll have to make some decisions," he leaned in and frowned. "You either stop it altogether, for good... or you end your relationship with Poe. Those are your options. There is no in between here."

Rey kept staring at her friend, amazed at how insightful he could be. She nodded in agreement.

"So be careful. When in doubt, abstinence," he said finally.

She kept staring at him in awe.

"You're really good at this," said Rey smiling still impressed.

"Thank you, I know. Experience has made me wise," he said smiling back. "But not cheap. You're buying lunch," he stated and raised his hand. "Waiter!"

Rey laughed and sat back on her chair, her arms crossed and her head swaying from side to side in false disapproval.

 

 

 

 

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

He blinked once and was suddenly in San Francisco. Rey's apartment was quiet and empty. The windows in the living room were open, letting in the sound of cars passing by, and a light, cool breeze.

But the breeze, though calming, did nothing to appease the heat and the humidity in the room. He had been there for thirty seconds and his shirt was already sticking to his back. He started to feel uncomfortable.

He looked around the living room searching for Rey. He could feel her there, but she was nowhere to be seen. This was the first time the bond had brought him to her only to find himself alone. Ben stopped for a moment and noticed the buzzing of an electric fan coming in from somewhere inside the apartment. He turned around towards the sound and followed it.

White voile curtains filtered the sunlight, moving in waves. The air, coming in through the open windows and from the swinging fan, lifted them up and made the veils dance in slow motion. Ben entered Rey's room slowly and quietly, full of doubt, not knowing exactly what he would find there. The sound of the fan was his only guide and once he fully stepped into the room, he found it to his left, in a corner, right in between a dresser and a chair. He turned to his right and found Rey's bed flanked by two bedside tables.

Inhaling louder, Ben froze in place.

On top of the bed, laying on her stomach and wearing nothing but panties and a t-shirt, Rey was sleeping, her arms bent, her right cheek resting on the back of her hands. Her eyes were closed and her lips, rosy and dewy, were parted, letting out a soft exhale sound as her body rose and collapsed with each breath. He had never seen her so vulnerable, so peaceful. He was inundated by a tremendous feeling of affection towards her—even tenderness. For some reason he had yet to understand, all he wanted to do was lay beside her and strike her hair while he watched her sleep. But as soon as he thought of that—to lay by her side, touch her—his eyes grew dark and he immediately focused his attention on her bare legs.

Though that feeling of tenderness had not dissipated, it was complemented with something else. Desire was now pumping through his veins and running at the speed of light to fill every inch of his body. He felt his heart thumping in his chest as he started feeling unbearably hot. He wondered why the bond had brought him there at that moment, but soon he forgot all about it, his full attention on Rey's body.

He felt like a creep, but he couldn't help himself. As he stood there, watching her, he snapped quick mental pictures of the delicate contour of her legs; the dew of sweat covering the skin behind her knees; that wrinkle forming in the middle of her panties; the loose shirt revealing a stripe of her lower back; her hair, no buns this time, softly tangled and curling in the back of her neck.

And her mouth. He decided he really liked her mouth—especially with her lips partially parted as they were. He could imagine kissing her softly at first and then slowly running the tip of his tongue over them. He would be calm at first, but he knew himself too well and was sure that slow pace would not last for long. Soon his tongue would want to get tangled up with hers, and his mouth would try desperately to eat her lips only to find it impossible. It would never be enough, he thought, but he would try.

Possessed by this thought, his mind clouded both by the heat and the sight of her, Ben took a few steps forward and got closer to the foot of the bed. Once he couldn't get any closer, he stopped and looked at her one more time. Suddenly, almost automatically, he reached out with his hand and brushed his fingers against her ankle. He caught himself doing this, startled at his own transgression. He swore that would be as far as he would go, but soon the back of his fingers was brushing the side of her calf. Her skin was smooth and so warm—a heat that would most certainly suffocate him in the most delicious way.

He was lost in this thought when, in the corner of his eye, he saw her head moving. He immediately gazed at her face and saw her there, wide awake, her eyes hooded, soft curls sticking to the side of her face. She had lowered her head and now was looking straight at him.

He froze in place, his eyes wide, ready to apologize. But just as he was about to open his mouth and try to explain, he noticed there was no irritation, or fear, or outrage coming from her. He searched through his own emotions—that deep desire now splattered with panic and shame—and through the bond found something that wasn't his. He could feel her utterly confident, curious, expectant—aroused.

He understood this had become something completely different, but he was still hesitant. The bond had never been a perfect science and he knew she already had enough reasons to be mad and never speak to him again—he expected her to. But she didn't recoil. Her brow didn't furrow. She hadn't even moved at all.

Ben knew what he wanted to do, but he was waiting for a signal—something, anything—that told him this is what she wanted too.

From the moment he had noticed her stare, he had not stopped looking at her. The back of his hand was still in place, his knuckles frozen in place. Suddenly, Rey raised an eyebrow and her lips twitched into a slight smile. He kept looking at her, still doubtful and tried moving his hand. This time, his knuckles moved slowly and upwards, drawing a line on the inside of her left leg. As he did this, Rey held his gaze, her eyes not blinking once. Suddenly, she shut her eyes, laid her head down and opened her legs just enough so Ben's hand could work his way up.

Ben continued to slowly brush the back of his hand upwards, his skin only slightly touching hers. An electric thrill ran through his body when, as he reached Rey's inner thigh, she grunted quietly, burying her face in the comforter. Pleasantly surprised and aroused beyond return, he lowered himself and softly kissed the back of Rey's knee. She trembled.

Finally confident of the situation, he used both of his big hands, one on each leg, fingers spread out, to slowly caress her. First the outer sides, then her thighs, down her knees and to the back of her ankles. His face was still low, his lips alternating kisses and bites up and down her legs. He could feel Rey tensing with anticipation, and through the bond he was able to feel an electrifying desire running all through her. He smiled at this realization.

Ben climbed on the bed and knelt between Rey's legs, his torso straight up. He watched her as she turned to face him. There, towering over her and in a double effort to impress her and getting around the suffocating temperature, he took off his shirt grabbing the back of it over his head and bringing it to the front. He shook his head to get his hair out of his eyes and, as he pulled his arms from the now knotted fabric, he saw Rey twisted at the waist, her forearm resting loosely on her left hip. He held her gaze for a second and relished on those dark, hungry looking eyes staring up at him.

Without looking away, he lowered himself over her, his face getting closer and closer to hers. Her lips parted just slightly, waiting for his. But he had no intention to kiss her. Not yet. When he was just a couple of inches from her and still not breaking her gaze, he quickly slid his right forearm underneath her waist and, in one swift move, pulled her hips upwards. Rey inhaled loudly, surprised by Ben's strong hold. Now she was almost in an all-fours position: she was kneeling, her hips in the air, but her back was curved, facing downwards, her weight on her elbows.

The sudden shift, plus the angle on her back, made her shirt slide slowly to her shoulders. Ben could now see she was wearing nothing underneath, and as he stood there, on his knees, towering over her, he could see her breasts dangling, begging for him to cup them.

That sent him into overdrive.

He slid his hands down her back as he lowered himself over her. His lips found her ass, while both his hands parted from Rey's spine searching for her breasts. He touched them, cupped them and squeezed them ever so slightly, feeling her nipples hard on his palms. She gasped and he couldn't help but moan at the touch of Rey's soft skin. Ben's lips were slowly kissing and nibbling her ass, breathing heavily and feeling more and more desperate as he heard Rey moaning and grunting. 

His hands moved to her hips and he buried his face between Rey's legs—the smell of her through her panties intoxicating him. He moved his face away and his hands slid from her hips to cup her ass, his thumbs tracing her panty line. Rey lifted herself from the bed, her weight now on her hands and knees. She turned her head around to look at Ben, her mouth open, her breathing heavy. Sensing her expectation, he straightened himself and, with the index and middle fingers in his left hand, lifted Rey's panties from the right. With his free hand, he slid between her legs and pressed his fingers up against her, feeling her wet and plump and full of desire. The moment Ben's fingers touched her, Rey shivered and, inhaling heavily, moaned loudly, her eyes closed.

Once he finished tracing her slit from front to back in slow motion, Ben searched for Rey's eyes again and, once he found them, he put his fingers in his mouth, tasting her. He did this staring right into her eyes, letting her know how much he wanted this, but also how delicious she tasted to him. Rey smiled and bit her lip. Ben smiled back and, refocusing his attention on her ass, he moved her panties to the left even further and, with his newly licked fingers, penetrated her. Rey let her head loose and moaned loudly. He left his fingers inside for just a second and then started to curve them and moving them in and out, first slowly, then faster. Rey started panting. He could feel her build up and started slipping his fingers in her more deeply and even faster, addicted to knowing, to feeling how good it was for her.

His fingers, damp with her wetness, now slid in and out easily, pumping her with more and more pleasure. As Rey was getting louder, he slowed down and calmly slid three fingers inside of her, tasting the waters. Rey arched her back upwards, letting out a deep moan. Ben relished and started again penetrating her a little faster. He started feeling her stiffen, her muscles tightening around him, her breathing irregular, her moans louder and louder. They had not said a word to each other since he appeared, all communication happening through touch and gazes. Maybe that's why he was surprised when, in the middle of Rey's moaning, she screamed his name, drowned in pleasure, exhausted of feeling so intensely.

Ben loved hearing his name and kept fingering her hard and deep until he felt her relaxing around him, her head down, her moaning now just a weak and exhausted panting. Rey let herself fall on her stomach over the bed and then turned around to lay on her back. From the bed, with her face contorted into a huge smile of satisfaction, she stared up at Ben, towering over her, shirtless, breathing heavily. He smiled at her and put his fingers in his mouth again. She giggled.

He could not believe how beautiful she was—in plain cotton panties, on the bed, her hair messy, that wide shirt drowning her a bit. He smiled again and lowered himself over her—this time he was looking for her lips. He felt her wanting and she held his gaze as he was drawing closer and closer to her. Inches away from her face, her breathing over him, he leaned in to kiss her for the first time.

"FUCK!" Ben shouted.

He jumped up, breathing heavily. He caught his breath and brushed his hands through his hair, disoriented.

He looked around—it was not his bedroom.

With flashbacks of his dream hitting him in a mental supercut, he tried to concentrate and remember where he was. When he turned to his left, he found her there, laying on her stomach, her long red hair dripping on the sides of her white shoulders.

Then he remembered. He was in The Village. It was the middle of the night and he had fallen asleep where he was not supposed to.

The girl to his left was not Rey.

It was against Ben's personal policy to spend the night with girls he was not seriously dating, but clearly, his exhaustion had betrayed him. As he slowly moved out of bed and gathered his clothes scattered on the floor, he thought of how tired he was, about how much work he had gotten done lately. Hux had even called him the other day to congratulate him. Ben was glad, but he knew congratulations were not in order. He wasn't doing anything for the benefit of the company, but to avoid thinking of her and the last time they saw each other. He tried to remember how much time had passed since that night, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. Two weeks? Four?

As he moved to the living room to get dressed, he wondered if she ever thought of him or if she was still angry about their fight. Probably yes. He could have handled it better, that's for sure. He thought he might wait until the next time the bond brought them together and apologize—explain to her he did not mean to be an asshole. Maybe he'd say something nice to her so she knew he was being sincere, but also so she would finally forget about ever thinking he didn't like her. But the opportunity had not come yet.

At first, he thought, in all of its wisdom, the bond was giving them both some space to think about what had happened. But then time went by and there was still no sign of her. He looked for ways to distract himself: work, workout, books, dates with random girls, beers with friends. Most of the times it worked.

Sometimes, like that night, it didn't.

Once he was fully dressed, he made sure he had everything with him and stepped out of the apartment. Opening up the main door of the building, he breathed in the cool night air and thought of getting a cab. But the night was much too nice, so he zipped up his jacket and decided to walk back home

From time to time, in between the buildings, he could see the lighter end of the night's gradient. Dawn was just around the corner.

And as he walked, he replayed the supercut of his dream in his head, trying to figure out a way to preserve the memory of her taste in his mouth.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Somehow I feel like this song is playing on the background when Ben walks home. 
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_4coiRG_BI


	7. Chapter 7

If only she knew how to apply makeup properly. 

It had been at least thirty minutes since she started trying that YouTube tutorial on how to do a smokey eye, and all she could manage to do was to make herself look like a raccoon. She knew this would take time and she planned for it to try and start over again at least a couple of times.

What she did not calculate, was that her elevated frustration with each failed attempt would make the next one even harder, more unbearable, and her desire to punch something would twitch her hand to such extent that applying eyeliner would be totally useless. 

She thought about Poe and felt envy. All he had to do on such occasions was to take a shower, shave and put on that nice suit she helped him pick up. And that was it. He was good to go. But for her, things were so much difficult. She had to take a shower, shave herself to perfection, do her nails, her makeup, her hair. That is not even considering wardrobe preparations: picking a dress, finding shoes that matched and would not kill her feet; a purse that would match both the shoes and the dress, and something to cover herself that was neither a hoodie or a puff jacket. 

And then again she had to worry about things such as weather and terrain—she once went to a wedding where she had to walk through a big lawn in heels thin as a needle. She remembers wobbling around, feeling stupid in a loose, silk dress, until she decided it was not worth it and took her shoes off, only to find them ruined and full of dirt. 

But now most of the tasks on her to-do list were done and the wedding started at 5:00 pm, which left her at least another hour before she had to leave. She could do it. She had been able to do things much more complicated than this. There was no reason for her not to master the art of the smokey eye. How hard could it be? 

"Shit..." she said in a low voice, clenching her right eye shut. Doing her waterline was the most nerve-wracking thing she's ever had to do and, as fate would have it, her trembling hand poked her eye with the pencil. When she managed to open it again, her eye was red and tears were running through her face, dragging the black pigment with it and ruining not only her eye but also the rest of her face. 

"Oh... no... motherfuck..." she said to herself and then she sighed, making peace with the fact that she'd have to do it all over again. When she turned around to get face wipes, she felt something in the living room and, assuming it was Poe, she shouted: "I'm in attempt number two and it all went to shit just now... do we really have to go to this thing?"

"We can always stay in and watch Netflix," said a low voice coming from outside the bathroom. That was not Poe. 

"Ben?" Rey asked looking at the closed door. 

"Yeah... Hi..." Ben said from the other side. Rey felt a void in her stomach. It had been over a month since the night they fought at his apartment and of course, the bond would choose this of all times to bring him back. She suddenly felt naked, looked down on her and realized she could not open the door in a bra and pajama shorts. She noticed a bathrobe hanging behind the door, put it on and knotted the waistband before turning the doorknob. When she opened, Ben was sitting on her bed beside her recently pressed party dress. 

"Nice dress," Ben said, nonchalant. "The color... it suits you."

Rey's brow furrowed. 

"What are you doing here?"

He sighed. 

"I don't know. I don't control this...

"...any more than you do. I know. I guess at this point it's only the first question that comes into mind in a situation like this, you know?" she said leaning against the door frame. 

"Where are you going?" asked Ben still sitting on the bed. 

"We're going to a wedding. A friend of Poe's is getting married so... we're going there to pay our respects to people making adult decisions, I guess!" she said smiling. 

"Well, unless you're going to a goth wedding, which in this day and age is absolutely possible, you still have to finish your makeup, right?" Ben said with a smirk. 

Feeling very self-conscious all of a sudden, Rey turned to the bathroom mirror and remembered what she was doing before Ben interrupted her. Embarrassed, she took the face wipe again and started to clean her face violently, hoping all that black eye shadow would just go away. 

"Hey, hey... don't do it like that! You're gonna melt your face!" Ben said from the other room. 

Rey turned around to look at him, stunned. "How am I supposed to do it then? This thing is waterproof, is hard to get off!"

"Well..." Ben stood up and looked around, searching for something. Then he bolted out of the room. 

Rey followed him with her eyes, losing sight of him when he darted out of her bedroom. "Hey, where are you going?" she shouted. 

"Where do you keep your condiments?" he asked from the kitchen. Rey could hear cupboards opening and closing. 

"My condiments?!" Rey asked herself. 

"Got it," he said, his footsteps coming closer. 

When he reappeared he had a bottle of olive oil in his hand, which he handed to Rey. She looked at it, not moving a muscle and then looked up at Ben, her eyebrows joined in the center of her face. "What am I supposed to do with that?" she said, her face a disgusted grimace. 

Ben rolled his eyes and walked past her to the bathroom, where he opened the bottle and poured a couple of drops on his left palm. Rey turned around to face him, still not knowing what he was doing, focusing on his big hands. She felt shivers down her spine. 

"May I?" said Ben, dipping two fingers in the olive oil. Rey nodded. "Close your eyes," he instructed. 

Rey winced in disbelief, but then exhaled, relaxed and closed her eyes. 

"I used to date this girl that insisted on getting all of her makeup off before going to bed," Ben said rubbing his index and middle fingers softly on Rey's eyelids, careful to rub off her eye shadow but not stretch her skin. "Since she didn't have any of her things at my place, she used to take the olive oil out of my kitchen and into the bathroom to wipe it off," he said rubbing his hands together and putting them on Rey's face, massaging it with his thumbs. "She said it was good for her skin too. Though I hated to have to go into the bathroom every time I wanted to eat a decent salad," he said, a smile coming across in his voice. 

Rey gave into the sensation and felt absolutely relaxed under Ben's oily hands. It was just her face, but the fact that those hands were touching her was surprising and, at the same time, absolutely welcomed. She felt how soft his touch was, how much effort he was putting into doing it as delicately as possible. Then, she felt his fingers under her chin, lifting her face to him, while his other hand cleaned the oil with a fresh face wipe. When he was done with her eyes, she opened them and saw him close to her, concentrated on her jawline, softly cleaning it. 

"What happened to the girl?" she asked to break the silence. He frowned a little bit. 

"We broke up. We didn't last long," he said, still looking at her face, but not her eyes. Rey focused her gaze on him, trying to get him to talk a little bit more. He sighed. "She wanted something more serious. She wanted something that would eventually lead her to the kind of event you're attending today," he said with a smirk, "but not as a guest."

"Oh..." she said, her eyes still on him. 

"And I wasn't ready," he said finally. "So that was it."

Ben took a step back and looked at Rey, who was blinking a lot, probably because of the oil residue in her eyes. 

"There," he said. "Now you can try it again." He smiled for a moment at her and then walked past her to reclaim his seat at the edge of the bed. Rey turned around and looked at herself in the mirror, checking her face and looking for any dark smudges. But her skin was absolutely clean. Without turning her body she looked at Ben and smiled. "Thank you. That was very helpful," she said. 

"You're welcome," he said with his head low, his elbows resting on his knees. 

Before Rey replayed the makeup tutorial on her phone or could even start applying the first of four different eye shadows included in this look, she turned to Ben again and looked at him curiously. "Why are you being so nice?" she asked, now turning her whole body to him, her shoulder on the door frame, her arms crossed at her chest. 

"What? I'm always nice..." he lied, jokingly. 

Rey laughed and he looked at her, a slight smile on his lips. 

"I'm sorry about the other day," he said after a moment of silence. "I didn't mean to be such a dick about it."

She smiled from the door frame, relaxed her arms and put her hands in the bathrobe's pockets. 

"Yeah, me too. That whole thing... it was uncalled for." He looked up at her and smiled. "So... are we friends again?" Rey said, extending her hand. 

Ben looked amused. 

"When have we ever been friends?" he asked, his brow furrowed. 

Rey opened her mouth in disbelief and just as she was about to withdraw her hand, Ben laughed. 

"I'm kidding! Yes... we're friends again," he said shaking her hand. 

She failed to fight back a smirk and said: "You monster." Ben looked down, still laughing. 

Rey turned around and saw herself in the mirror once again. Then she picked up her phone and saw the time. 

"Shit..." she said. 

"What?" Ben replied. 

"I have to finish getting ready... can you hand me my dress?" Rey said pointing to the large bag beside Ben. He took the hanger and handed it to her. She thanked him and closed the bathroom door behind her. 

Ben sat there for a moment, trying to make up the sounds coming in from inside of the bathroom. He laughed when he thought he heard Rey trip with something and as he did, he laid back on the bed, looking at the ceiling first, then turning his head to look at the headboard. He had only been there in his dream, but it is exactly how he pictured it. He tried to remember the dream and played that supercut of images he had in his head. He closed his eyes and started remembering her, the sounds, her skin, her taste... he smiled to himself and decided it was no use to entertain such thoughts. Especially because he knew what would happen once he started to remember and, unlike his office, there was no place here for him to go undetected to manage the situation happening in his jeans.

When he heard the bathroom door, he prompted himself up on his elbows and watched as Rey stepped out with a dark golden dress on. It was a simple cut, tight on her waist, the skirt loose and down to just below her knees. The neckline was deep enough for him to get distracted, but not too much to call unwanted attention. She looked at him and opened her eyes wide. 

"So, what do you think?" she said twirling around, giving Ben a look at the backless dress. 

His jaw dropped a little bit and he stammered before saying: "Y-you look good... yeah, that looks good on you." 

Rey was not stupid. She knew exactly what she had just provoked in him. The whole idea of coming out of the bathroom like that was intended to test him. He had agreed to be friends with her again, but Ben was right: when had they ever been friends? It pleased her to see him looking at her like that. To see that something might still happen if she wanted it to. She had not decided on that one yet, but she was glad to know it was still a possibility. 

And then there was the punch line to this joke.

"Can you help me with this?" she said turning around. 

Ben's jaw dropped a little further as he sat up on the bed again. Rey pulled her hair over her left shoulder to let him see the top part of her dress had two pieces of fabric that had to be tied up behind her neck. 

"Can you tie them up again? It's a little loose right now..." she said totally nonchalant. 

Ben cleared his throat. "Okay..." he said trying to come off relaxed. Rey could not see him but she felt his nervousness. She bit her lower lip expectantly, noticing the soft brush of his fingers on her back. What she had not anticipated in this little ruse of hers, was that Ben's fingers, even though they brushed her back only slightly, made her skin crawl in the best of ways. Ben, not being a fool himself and having Rey's back only inches away from his face, noticed the tiny, transparent hairs on her back standing up to the slightest touch of his hand. Rey was clever, but he now knew the game she was playing and knew how to play it too. 

He took his time, faking being confused with the fabric, pretending not to know how to make a bow properly. At one point, he let go of the ties and sighed heavily, just so she could feel his breath on her back. Rey held her breath and shivered before telling him not to worry, that she could do this herself. 

"No," Ben said, his voice firm and lower than usual. "I got it.

Rey looked at him over her shoulder and smiled a little, saying nothing. 

Ben moved forward, sitting in the very edge of the bed. Every time he exhaled, Rey could feel it on her back. Ben took the ties, one in each hand, and before he even attempted to tie a knot, he looked at Rey's naked back, taking a mental picture, editing it into his mental supercut. He noticed the tiny moles over her ribs, the line of her spine, the freckles on her shoulders. He could lick them. With his wrists laying against her back and in soft, delicate moves that made his fingers touch her skin every time they could, Ben tied a tiny bow on the back of Rey's neck. As he tightened it, he moved his face even closer and taking advantage of the distraction, laid a soft and almost undetectable kiss on the curve of Rey's spine, just above the end of the dress's zipper. 

Rey noticed, of course. But she didn't say anything. She just bit her lip and smiled. 

"All done?" she said finally, over her shoulder. 

"All done," he said from behind her. 

Rey went back to the bathroom and turned around, trying to see the bow in the mirror. "Hey, Ben Solo! Good job! Who knew you could tie a nice bow?" she said. 

He laughed a little and laid back on the bed again, his weight on his elbows. "Well, I've been told I'm very skillful with my hands," he said with a smirk. 

Rey laughed. "God... seriously? That line works for you?" she said looking at him from the bathroom. He laughed and shrugged. 

She picked up her phone and looked at the time. 

"Fuck! Now I'm really late! What am I going to do with my make up?" she said looking at herself in the mirror. 

"Just do something simple," he said from the bedroom. "You'll still look beautiful."

Rey froze in place and after a few seconds turned her head around to face him, but the moment she did, he was gone. 

Trying to ignore what just happened, she turned into the mirror again, put some concealer, did her eyebrows minimally, curled her lashes, put a discrete layer of mascara and painted her lips red. With half of her hair up, she smiled as she put a hint of blush on her cheeks. 

Still reeling from that last phrase, she leaned against the door frame again to put her heels on, looking at the space filled by Ben only a minute ago. 

When she was done, she stood up in silence and froze in place. 

"God, don't let it be a month before I see him again," she said under her breath. 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys!! Thank you so much for reading! 
> 
> I hope you're enjoying yourselves and having a great time. I know I am!
> 
> Just so you know, this fanfic is being written on a weekly basis and though I do have some ideas of where this story is going, I'd love to hear some of your suggestions: What scenes are you imagining? What should happen? How should it happen? 
> 
> I'll keep an eye on the comments to get some of your feedback and maybe I'll incorporate it into the fanfic -- with the corresponding credit, of course. 
> 
> Thank you so much for your good vibes and, if you like what you read, please leave a comment! I'd love to know what you're thinking :)


	8. Chapter 8

"One chicken chop suey, two servings of spring rolls, one beef chop suey, one chicken chow mein, no scallions; pick up beer on the way back. One chicken chop suey, two servings of spring rolls..."

 

Rey repeated the list on her head like a mantra as she walked down the street towards the Chinese restaurant she and Poe love so much. She could have wrote it down, but since the place was only a couple of blocks away, she decided she could handle it. So much was her faith in her own memory, she decided not to take the elevator back to her apartment when she realized she had left her phone.

 

"...One chicken chow mein, no scallions; pick up beer on the way back..." she repeated under her breath.

 

Picking up take-out was mostly Poe's job, but since he had called earlier saying he'd be a little late, she offered to go pick up the food herself. They were having a couple of friends of Poe's over for dinner, so the list of things she had to get was double their usual order. And thus, double as hard to remember.

 

"...One beef chop suey, one chicken chow mein... or was it two?" she said stopping to a halt in the middle of the sidewalk. She doubted herself for a second, but finally decided it was only one order of chicken chow mein. She looked up and relief washed over her when she realized she was standing right outside the Chinese restaurant. Fearing more of the order would slip away from her mind, she shut her eyes tight—as if that would help her remember—and opened the door.

 

"I'm sorry Mr. Wen! I have to say this really fast or I'm going to forget! I need one chicken chop suey, two servings of spring rolls, one beef chop suey, one chicken chow mein, no scallions," she said very fast and very loudly, her eyes still shut.

 

But her order was lost in an even louder cloud of noise—hundreds of slightly shouted conversations happening at once, the sound of champagne glasses hitting each other softly in multiple toasts, hysteric laughter, music. Rey opened her eyes and suddenly found herself in the middle of a bar boiling with people. Blinking fast, she looked behind her and noticed it was already dark, the entrance of the place looking nothing like Mr. Wen's restaurant.

 

That's when it hit her she was no longer in San Francisco.

 

Making her peace with the fact that trying to remember the order would now be a waste of time, she calmed herself and noticed Ben's presence in the room. A guy as tall and big as him should be very noticeable even in this crowd, she thought, so she stood by the door—the most elevated corner of the bar—and scanned faces hoping to find him. As she did, two gorgeous looking girls with the longest legs she has ever seen walked past her and accidentally bumped her shoulder. "Ow!" she mouthed as she rubbed her arm with her left hand, her brow furrowed.

 

The place looked fancy but cool, and Rey suddenly felt deeply self-conscious. Her whole appearance stood out in this place not because she was wearing some of those outrageous and awful neon 90's athleisure get-ups she'd seen people wear on Instagram—the kind of outfit that is so ugly it looks fashionable—but because she looked too much of a regular person to actually be in a place like this. There she stood, in distressed skinny jeans, Chuck Taylors and a $5 Old Navy t-shirt; no makeup, her hair in a messy half bun, and a dirty tote bag on her shoulder. Having the Bundchen twins walk past her just now, even if it was just for a second, felt like a jab right in the middle of her self esteem.

 

Knowing her luck, she thought surely those girls had come to meet Ben. The very concept of that made her stomach churn and her jaw jut out of position. She looked for the girls again and followed them with her eyes, sure that they would lead her to Ben. But the Bundchen twins joined a party at the back of the bar, where other girls just as stunningly beautiful as them rested their wrists in the shoulders of guys in suits whose haircuts she bet costed a little under her end-of-year bonus.

 

Somehow, not seeing Ben in that cohort made her sigh with relief. But the feeling didn't last long. Just as her eyes wandered away from the Bundchen twins' party, Rey found Ben at the bar. His hand was on a bottle of beer, his lips moving up and down, and very close to a beautiful woman leaning her back on the bar, her elbows on the very edge, her long neck extended to the sky as she laughed at whatever Ben had just said in her ear.

 

Rey had always prided herself of not being a jealous woman. She has not been like that with Poe and she had not been like that with any other of her previous boyfriends and crushes. She was always either too confident in her relationships to ever feel threatened, or so replaced she would go straight to resignation and moving on. But this... this was something new altogether. A new feeling. She felt enraged by this woman, her first instinct to walk down there and pull the extensions out of her hair in a single and forceful yank. But why was she even thinking about her? Why would Rey blame her? It was not her fault she was getting hit by Ben. He was the womanizer scumbag who managed to have more girlfriends than she had unread emails in her inbox.

 

Not even stopping to think how irrational the feeling was, Rey walked up to the bar and ordered a beer. She sat there, right in the corner, and sipped her bottle while aiming her gaze straight at Ben, her eyebrows so close together they looked like a single one. He had not noticed her. He was too entertained with this girl Rey could swear was called Vanessa and had the worst sense of humor in the world since she seemed to laugh at every single word coming out of Ben's mouth. Trying to regain control of her senses, Rey took a sip of her beer and furtively looked down at the now lighted screen of someone else's phone on the bar. She noticed the time—1:30 am—and remembered a conversation she had with Finn a while ago.

 

"It was past 1:30 am and he still was not giving me the signal..." Finn had said annoyed.

 _  
_ "What signal?"

 _  
_ "The signal, Rey! The 'You're-Coming-Home-With-Me signal"

 

"Oh... I see. And what about 1:30 am?" Rey had asked.

 

"What about 1:30 am?"

 

"Why did you mentioned it? As if it were important..." Rey had insisted.

 

"Oh, because that's the bar golden hour! Everybody knows that!" Finn had said matter-of-factly. Rey had raised her eyebrows waiting for further explanation. "It's when people are drunk and loose enough to make the first round of decisions as to who are they taking home that night. Pretty people get chosen before that for obvious reasons," Finn had rolled his eyes, "but it's at about 1:30 am that the magic starts to happen and people start leaving the bar in search of somewhere... quieter."

 

"Oh," Rey had said again. "And what about the rest of the people? Do they go home in this twisted sexual version of _The Hunger Games_?"

 

"Not necessarily. Think about it this way: the longer you stay at the bar, the more alcohol is required for somebody to choose you as their hookup that night. That's why I always leave parties at 3 am. It is absolutely mortifying to stay alone later than that."

 

"That is so mean!" Rey had said appalled.

 

"I know baby, but Pat Benatar said it first: Love is a battlefield."

 

Suddenly back at the bar, Rey panicked. It would be a matter of minutes before Ben took this girl's hand and led her to the entrance, out to the street, into a cab, and up to his apartment. She did not want to see this but she could not look away. Ben still had no idea she was staring at him from the corner of the bar. This she knew for a fact because, with the exception of that split second in which she saw the time on that stranger's phone, she had never taken her eyes off Ben.

 

The girl kept laughing and Rey felt herself sink in the stool. Suddenly, the girl took her clutch bag and leaned into Ben to say something in his ear. Ben nodded and she walked to the back of the room, probably going to the bathroom. Rey felt tempted to walk down to where Ben was now alone, leaning on the bar and looking at his phone, probably swiping a little more. But suddenly he blocked the screen, turned around sipping his beer, and in doing so, met Rey's gaze. Not even worried about disguising her annoyance, Rey smiled sarcastically and raised her now empty beer bottle at him. He smirked and started to make his way through the crowd in her direction.

 

"Hey, didn't see you there," he said when he finally reached her. Rey raised her hand to catch the bartender's attention and tapped the mouth of her bottle twice to order another beer. The bartender nodded.

 

"Yeah, well... I'm enjoying myself," said Rey sarcastically.

 

"I can see that," Ben said as the bartender picked up Rey's empty bottle and replaced it with a new one. She took a sip and looked straight forward to a couple in the other end of the bar finishing their drinks and leaving. Probably to go have sex, Rey thought.

 

"How was the wedding?" Ben asked trying to make conversation.

 

"It was good," Rey said, but Ben couldn't hear her, so she moved closer to speak directly into his ear. "It was good," she repeated, this time inhaling the scent of Ben's shampoo. He showered before coming here because he knew he was getting laid, Rey thought. "The bastard," she mouthed to herself.

 

Puzzled by Rey's eloquence, Ben leaned his back on the bar, his elbows on the edge, and sipped his beer.

 

"Who's the girl?" Rey asked after a moment of silence, surprised at the words that had just come out of her mouth.

 

Ben froze in place and then took another sip of beer, trying to buy himself some time to find a good answer.

 

"Just a girl I'm seeing," he said finally.

 

"Is it serious?" Rey asked, now her whole body turned to him. Ben turned to her, a single elbow on the bar, a smirk on his face.

 

"Are you jealous?" he said, one side of his mouth pulling up.

 

"No," she said pouting her lower lip a little bit; calmly but unconvincingly. "I'm just curious."

 

_That pout..._

 

"This is so funny considering how many times I had to watch yours' and Poe's relationship milestones," he said still with a smirk. "But you see me with a girl once and suddenly you're annoyed," he scoffed.

 

"That is different! Me and Poe are in a serious relationship, not on some random hookup!" she said defensively.

 

"Well, you don't actually know that," said Ben refusing to feed Rey's tantrum. "Plus, I was there when your relationship started—when it was, as you said, some random hookup," Rey's brow furrowed even further and her mouth opened in offended. "How do you know this is not that for me? Abbi could be the one, you know?" Ben said, his eyebrows raised.

 

"Oh please... you don't believe in those things, Ben Solo," she said scoffing and looking straight ahead.

 

"I could, you know? You and Poe are such a good example of monogamous bliss. Maybe it's time for me to settle down..." Ben said, now straight out smiling.

 

Rey just looked at him from the side of her eye, as she took another sip. She was still looking ahead when she noticed Abbi— _Abbi!—_ in the spot where Ben was, turning her head from side to side, looking for him. Rey scoffed and raised her bottle to take another sip.

 

"Hey Solo, your girlfriend is looking for you." Something inside her immediately regretted having said that—she could have kept quiet. Perhaps then Abbi— _ABBI!!—_ would have thought Ben had ditched her and gone home. What a tragedy...

 

"Oh, thank you," Ben said standing up. "And she's not my girlfriend."

 

"Oh, but she may be the one!" Rey said as Ben was leaving, her voice filled with feigned wonder.

 

"She could! But I don't know! Do you?" Ben said with a sarcastic smile on his face, hunching his shoulders. Then he turned around and walked in Abbi's direction—...—just in time to miss Rey flipping him her middle finger from the bar stool.

 

Rey sipped her beer one more time as she watched Ben put his large hand on Abbi's lower back and jolt his head in the main door's direction. Abbi smiled and nodded. Ben finished his beer, left his bottle on the bar, took Abbi's hand and led her towards the door. When they were close to where Rey was sitting, Ben looked at her and winked almost imperceptibly. Rey furrowed her brow and pouted her lower lip in utter annoyance. She waited for them to have their full backs to her and she turned around to watch them leave. They were both smiling.

 

Rey turned to the bar and finished her second bottle of beer, trying to think of a good excuse for taking so long to pick up the take-out from Mr. Wen's restaurant. The bartender slid the check her way and Rey gave him her card. When he was back with the receipt, she started filling the blanks and mouthed her new mantra.

 

"One chicken chop suey, two servings of spring rolls, one beef chop suey, one chicken... one chicken..."

 

She was signing when she realized she didn't remember what came next.

 

"Crap."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This week's credits roll with this song 
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=av5JD1dfj_c
> 
> I'm starting to create a whole soundtrack for this fic in my mind... It sounds amazing! 
> 
> I'll share it once it takes a more robust shape. 
> 
> I'm also drawing a lot! Gonna work on those and will share as well. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy! :)


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys, I'm so sorry this took so long! I turned in my master's thesis this week and then had to take care of all the things I stopped doing because of it. 
> 
> I've had this chapter in my head since the last time I updated the fic and I just cannot express how frustrating it was not to find time to actually write it. Now I live in a dumpster of an apartment and have no clean underwear but at least I could get this thing done and out of my system. 
> 
> I'm working on illustrations that I may post here or on Tumblr... I'm still figuring that out, but hopefully, they will be great companions to this fic. 
> 
> Thank you for your support, kudos, comments, and understanding! Hope you enjoy :)

 

"This is what you're wearing?" said Rose quizzically, her eyes rolling up and down Rey's body from head to toe.

And she was right to ask too. They were going to one of those cool clubs in San Francisco, the ones girls only in short, tight dresses and high heels are let in. Rose was abiding by the code, wearing a dress and heels herself. But Rey was not. She was wearing her hair in her usual three-bun do, tight ripped jeans, a loose shirt, and some Chuck Taylors.

She looked at Rose as if there was nothing to be seen or noted. "What is wrong with this?" said Rey nonchalant, the corners of her lips pulling up.

"Well, you do know where we're going, right?" said Rose matter-of-factly.

"Yes, I know. And yes I know I'm not wearing the most appropriate outfit for such a  _fancy_  place," she said rolling her eyes and doing air quotes mockingly. "But unlike you," she continued, "I'm not going hunting for cute boys. I'm going to spend a nice time with you guys... and to dance my stress off until I can stand no more."

Rose kept looking at her, her eyebrows raised and meeting at the middle of her face. "Uh huh..."

"Think about it this way: for me, this is closer to going to the gym than the social experience of going dancing to a club," Rey said.

"So why don't you just go to the gym, distress and then put on a nice little dress and come with us?" Rose asked.

"Because it's not the same!" said Rey along with a voice coming out of the bathroom. It was Finn, who had been listening to the entire conversation while finishing the last touches to the masterpiece that was his hair. His head popped out of the bathroom to look at Rose.

"Honey, this is a Rey thing. You can't imagine the sort of places I've gone with her dressing like this! Beautiful people, crystal chandeliers, Dom flowing all night and she... standing there in sneakers," he turned to Rey and made a grimace. "Anyway, she's not gonna crump up your style or mine, for that matter. She's just going to hit the dancefloor all night and only exit it to grab a bottle of beer when she's near fainting. Isn't that right, hun?" Finn's head turned to Rey smiling. She nodded with a wide, closed, and satisfied smile.

"That's right! Besides, Finn knows the bouncer, so they're gonna let us in. I promise!" said Rey trying to reassure Rose.

Rose squinted her eyes and made a pout with her mouth.

"Okay! Fine!" she said putting a hand on her hip. "But if you're gonna be 'the weird girl' at the club, and some hot guy comes on to me and makes a joke about you, I'm gonna laugh and I won't even feel guilty about it."

Faking to be moved by Rose's words, Rey furrowed her brow and hugged her. "Aww... and that's how you'll be able to tell the hot guy who came on to you in the club is a total jerk," she said with her head on her shoulder. Rose laughed and Rey followed.

Finn came out of the bathroom dressed all in black, except for some perfectly white sneakers that managed to look even fancier than any black leather shoe. Scandalized, Rey opened her mouth and pointed at them, but before she could let out a word, Finn closed his eyes and lifted his index finger, stopping her in her tracks.

"If you dare to say anything about the fact that I'm wearing sneakers in order to defend yourself from all the shit we've been giving you about your outfit tonight, let me just tell you these are brand new collector's Nike Air Max, so rare and magnificent, they wouldn't be caught dead at the same store as your filthy Chuck Taylors. So save yourself the embarrassment and keep that sexy pout of yours shut," he said in a single breath.

Rey opened her mouth once again as if to say something, but then just shrugged, defeated. "Sometimes I still don't know why I'm friends with you guys, but I love you even if you bully me about this."

Finn walked over to her, hugged her and kissed her forehead. "Anytime, sugar."

 

* * *

 

An hour later, Finn, Rose, and Rey were leaning against the bar, the first round of drinks in their hands. Rose, with a glass of champagne in her hand, looked over to the crowd, scanning the room to see who she was falling victim to that night. Finn, a tall glass of vodka tonic in his hand, did the same, though his attitude was less of the victim and more of the hunter—he was looking for prey. Preferably young. Preferably tall. Preferably willing to screw him in the bathroom. 

Rey, stood there with them, her elbow in the verge of the bar. She took a sip from her beer and waited for the right song to come on. It was always something unexpected, something that suddenly forced her to leave whatever conversation she was having unfinished and move to the center of the dancefloor. But it hadn't come yet, and meanwhile, she stood there, holding the bar, studying the room.

Girls in short skirts and high heels inundated the place, but unlike the last time she was in a place like this—in Manhattan, of all places—she did not feel uncomfortable. In fact, she felt empowered, feeling the pressure of sexual conquest in the air but willingly not taking any part of it. 

This was not her scene, but once in a while, she liked to come here and dance—just dance until the club's lights came on. It had been a while since the last time she did this, but that fight with Poe the other day set her off. That and the amount of work she had been handling at the office. That and a certain someone crowding her thoughts from time to time.

"Excuse me," said Finn suddenly, his tone low and dark. He sipped from his vodka tonic, winked to the girls and walked into the crowd to get lost.

"Who's the victim now?" Rey asked Rose almost shouting, her eyes looking straight ahead.

"I don't know," she said over the noise, but then followed Finn with her eyes to find him coming on to a tall, lean but built guy who met Finn with a smile.

"Oh..." said Rose. "He is cute!"

"Yeah... He looks like an undergrad though," Rey said.

"Isn't that Finn's thing nowadays?"

Rey froze for a moment and started thinking about Finn's latest hook-up stories. "You're totally right," she said smiling and taking another sip from her beer.

"So..." Rose said turning her head towards her, "I hope you don't mind, but Finn told me you had a huge fight with Poe."

Rey grimaced at the thought. She hadn't forgotten, but every time she was reminded of the fight, her stomach twisted with a combination of anger, boredom, and just plain exhaustion. "Yeah... it was very domestic, but it escalated and right now things are kind of rough." She drank again. "He's actually staying with a friend for a couple of days. He said he needed some space."

"I'm so sorry to hear that," said Rose trying to sound supporting even though she was shouting in Rey's ear.

"No, it's ok," Rey said still not looking at her. "I needed space too. It's been a weird couple of weeks, so it's better for both of us."

"Is that why you wanted to come dancing tonight?" Rose asked, her eyes already locked with a guy across the room.

And then it finally happened.

_Heaven..._

Rey knew this was her cue. 

_Heaven..._

She smiled, took the last sip of her beer and looked at Rose in the eye before unglueing herself from the bar and shouting "Exactly!"

_Heaven..._

_Take me home, take me home / I know another place to be / Take me home, take me home / You deserve a girl like me_

_  
_ The moment Rey hit the dancefloor she started moving and all her problems melted away. She closed her eyes and sang along with the lyrics, knowing everything around her was way too loud for anyone to notice if she sounded off-key or not. She started making her way into the crowd, taking any space the mass would allow her to have. But then, as she moved and twirled and extended her arms first to the sides and then over her head, she claimed her space, taking it by assault. 

_Let's make a move, let's leave this world behind / I know you approve by the look in your eyes_

Rey had claimed her territory. There was no moving her now. This was home for the night and anybody who wanted to trespass these limits would have to deal with her rules. Though her outfit deterred most guys to come on to her, there were some who took their chances. They walked through the crowd, making their way through a sea of bodies to get her to say yes to a drink with them. But the trope was always the same—she would hear them, but not really listen to them. She would never stop dancing. She would nod and smile. She would politely say no, and then she would keep on dancing. 

For Rey rejecting men had nothing to do with getting back at Poe. It didn't even have to do with the pleasure of saying no to someone who showed interest in her. It wasn't about flirting. This was her moment to get lost and have a good time. And for that, she didn't need Poe or any other guy, for that matter. On the dancefloor Rey was happy, and that night, she needed happy.

A while passed but Rey was not sure how long. In those situations, time was not measured in minutes or seconds, but in songs and bottles of beer. There had been two of those, one quick trip to the restroom, two times redoing her hair, and three guys who came and went empty-handed. 

Suddenly, she felt someone was dancing close to her back. 

Rey turned around in hope of finding something—she didn't even know what—and instead found Finn next to her, drunk to the bone, dancing with his eyes closed and bumping into her from time to time. She laughed and got closer to shout straight into his ear: 

"What happened to that cute guy you were talking to earlier?"

Finn took a step back, squeezed his eyes shut, and with a grimace shook his head from side to side. 

"Nothing. He was a dick," he said. He paused and then moved closer to Rey's ear again: "Everybody seems to be a dick tonight... including that guy that has been eyeing you for the past half hour."

"What guy?" she said turning around, still dancing. "That one with khakis over there? He already came and offered to buy me a drink. He seemed a little lame."

Finn stepped back again and squinted his eyes in the direction Rey was looking at. 

"No," he pouted. "That other guy, sitting in the back. All in black, looking like a sulky emo teenager who can't afford to go to a Good Charlotte concert."

Rey turned around again and scanned the crowd. The club was full, and maybe it was because of that or because of the beer, but faces already had started to melt into each other. She kept looking for the guy Finn had mentioned, and after a while, right before she was about to give up, she found him. Alone, laying back on a chair like he owned the place, looking at her intently, Ben smirked and raised the tall glass he had in his right hand.  

Rey opened her eyes wide in surprise. She had not felt him among so many people. In any other situation, she would have felt self-conscious and a little embarrassed. How long had Finn said he had been looking at her? And what was she wearing! Maybe Rose was right and she should've put on a nice dress. Now she was not only wearing jeans and a t-shirt but was also sweaty, and her hair was a mess, sticking to the sides of her forehead and curling in the back of her neck.

Yes, in any other situation she would've felt all of those things and would have either ran to the restroom to check herself or prayed to whatever deity that would listen for the earth to crack open and swallow her whole. But she was a little drunk and utterly happy, so she felt none of it— on the contrary, she felt powerful and sexy. Ben was in her territory now, so if someone was to feel intimidated, it would not be her. She looked at him and smirked, satisfied, as if his presence had no importance.

What happened next she couldn't have staged it. Even if she had asked the DJ to play that song, it couldn't have come in a more perfect moment. 

The speakers buzzed loudly one... two... three... times.

Finn took her arm, turned her around to face him, and looked at her with eyes wide, his whole face turned into a drunken smile. He had that look—the "This is our song" look.

One buzz... two buzzes... three buzzes...

_Knew he was a killer, first time that I saw him / Wonder how many girls he had loved and left haunted..._

Mouthing each lyric, Rey and Finn danced in unison like nothing mattered, everyone surrounding them just a blur in the background. But of course, things were no longer the same. Rey tried hard not to look in Ben's direction so as not to cross his gaze, but even though she couldn't see him, she could feel his stare burning her skin like the summer sun at noon. From time to time, she would spin around and try to see if he was still there. Maybe he had found something else to do—another Abbi to hit on. 

But nothing changed. Every time she spun, from the corner of her eye, she could find him there. He was sitting still in the same place, his eyes on her, knowing exactly what she was doing. 

She found herself enjoying every bit of Ben's attention and the thought of him watching her dance made her tingle in her very core. So she very willingly, very consciously danced for him—touched her neck, closed her eyes, bit her lips, laughed as loud as she could. She relished in his intent gaze—the fact that the only guy she would accept a drink from, couldn't get his eyes off her. 

As the chorus of the song was approaching, Rey swayed her hips and smiled at the accuracy of the words. She mouthed each and every line for him, in the same way she would have passed a handwritten note to him all the way to the back of the classroom if they had been in high school. 

_In the middle of the night, in my dreams / You should see the things we do, baby / In the middle of the night, in my dreams / I know I wanna be with you, so I'll take my time..._

And for the first time since she saw him there, she turned around to face him. As she saw him run his fingers through his hair, she deliberately opened her eyes wide and mouthed:

_...Are you ready for it?_

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is very musical. Maybe Sophie Ellis Bextor doesn't resonate that much with you, but hey, I'm old and that song is amazing, so take a listen. And regarding Taylor Swift, how perfect is the line "in the middle of the night, in my dreams, you should see the things we do, baby"? I mean... if they only knew.
> 
>  Sophie Ellis Bextor - [Take me Home](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6gLOmjP5GY)
> 
>  Taylor Swift - [...Ready for it?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIft-t-MQuE)


	10. Chapter 10

She made her way back into consciousness very slowly. She opened her eyes a little, but before the image became clear and the morning light penetrated her eyes, she shut them again. Wincing, she turned around on her stomach and looked for sleep once again. 

 

Where had she left off? 

 

Oh, yes. 

 

As always he had come and they had fought, but the reasons always changed. Sometimes he said something mean—sometimes she did. Sometimes she said something deliberately hurtful or offensive. Maybe something about him being alone because he is unbearable. Then he would look at her with disdain from the corner of his eye and say something worse. She'd look back at him, flames in her eyes. Then she'd start shouting. 

 

What never changed was what came after that. At one point, after the screaming and the hurtful words, they would look at each other and stop, gasping and exhausted from fighting. Then he would take a step towards her and she'd take another. Instinctively, she would come close to him and smell his neck while he stood there, immobile. Then she'd look up, meet his gaze, and close the gap that separated their mouths. 

 

It would not take long for things to heat up. He'd put his arms around her to pull her to him—she'd put her arms around his neck and her fingers through his hair to pull him closer to her. He'd bite her lower lip and she'd wince a little, enjoying that tiny pang of pain. He'd put his big hands just below her ass and sit her on the kitchen counter. At that moment, she'd feel her panties get wet and her core tremble in anticipation. 

 

She furrowed her brow, realizing her dream was doing everything but helping her to go back to sleep. She tried opening her eyes again, but the light hurt and confirmed what she'd been suspecting—there was a headache lurking and waiting to make her life miserable. Probably for the entire day. She closed her eyes and reached out to her bedside table to find some Advil. With her face buried in the pillow, she patted her way to the drawer—it felt different. She patted further. Her alarm clock was nowhere to be found and her phone was not charging there as it usually was.

 

It was then, after she inhaled deeply in exasperation, that she realized the smell on the sheets. It was not hers. It was not Poe's either. Shocked, she lifted her head, and with her arm still extended toward the nightstand, she turned to her left to find a dark figure contrasting with the morning light coming from the window behind it. She opened her eyes a little wider and focused on the image. There, wearing shorts and a t-shirt, his hair a little wet from sweat, and headphones dangling around his neck, Ben stood by the bed and looked down at her with a smirk. 

 

"Good morning, sunshine," he said. Rey didn't realize he had a sports drink in his hand until he extended his arm to offer it to her. "Here. Maybe this will help."

 

A little mortified, Rey sat up in the bed as her head started to pound. She thanked him and took the drink from Ben's hand. She took a long sip and realized it was orange Gatorade, the worst of its kind in Rey's book. "Jesus... why do you drink this crap?" she asked, her eyes still not fully open. 

 

"What else do you want me to drink? The blue ones?"

 

"You mean the best ones? Yeah, exactly," she replied, looking at Ben and getting blinded by the glare coming from behind him. He turned around and closed the curtains a little so the sun wouldn't hit her in the face. 

 

"Thank you," she said, as she took the scene in.

 

She was laying in Ben's bed, in Manhattan. Her shoes were on the floor and her hair was a poor remnant of her three-bun-do. The room was almost the same as the last time she saw it: book piles crowded the corners, a couple of shirts were laying on the floor and Ben's bag was at the foot of the bed. The only difference from that other time was the bed. Then, it was unmade, the sheets tangled in knots. Now that she was in it, everything seemed neater, as if she had just laid there and somebody had pulled the covers over her. The realization was interrupted by panic when, to the right of Ben's bag, he saw a pair of neatly folded jeans. They were hers. 

 

Ben sat at the edge of the bed by her side while he rolled the headphones around his phone, which he then placed on his nightstand. Then he sighed and looked at Rey, amused. She suddenly felt very self-conscious and realized she had no idea how she had gotten there. 

 

"Did... did I just appear here?" she said hugging the Gatorade bottle to her chest. 

 

"Well..." Ben said laughing a bit, "I wouldn't put it that way. I mean, yes, you did just appear here... as always," he said matter-of-factly. Rey looked at him and raised her eyebrows. 

 

"Like in your bed? Like, you were sleeping, you turned around and boom, there I was?" she said, scandalized. 

 

"Oh no," he said, "nothing as subtle as that."

 

Rey opened her eyes wide and raised her eyebrows even higher for him to elaborate. 

 

"You appeared in the middle of the night, drunk, and came looking for the bed," he said. 

 

Horrified, Rey mouthed an "Oh my God" and turned to her left to bury herself in the pillows. "IM SO SORRY," she said, her words muffled by the sheets. She felt the mattress moving as Ben laughed. 

 

"It's ok. I was reading and I heard you in the living room. Before I could stand, you were already here. You shushed me, took off your pants, and..."

 

" _I_  took off my pants?!" Rey said scandalized again, lifting her head from the pillows and sitting up to look at Ben. 

 

"Yep. I took the liberty of folding them. They didn't go well with the decor," he said mockingly. 

 

"Oh my God," she said, a smile making its way briefly through the embarrassment. "I'm... so... so, sorry."

 

"Again, it's ok. It was actually pretty funny because I got to test our bond a little," he said standing up and moving towards the foot of the bed. "When I woke up you were still here. Then I went for a run totally expecting you to be gone by the time I got back—you know, because of the distance and everything—but here you are!"

 

"Is that bad?" said Rey, looking confused. 

 

"Oh no," Ben said figuring out what she meant. "It just means that even though we put distance between us while we are  _visiting,_ " he said the word rolling his eyes, "the bond doesn't break. I ran for forty-five minutes and you're still here, so... yeah."

 

Rey pondered the idea for a minute. "Cool," she finally said, more to fill the silence than actually being excited about Ben's discovery. She had other mysteries to solve. She tried thinking about what had happened the night before. Still hugging the bottle of Gatorade, she remembered Rose making fun of her outfit and then Finn dancing beside her. He was really drunk. Was she? Not as much as he was. At least as far as she can remember. 

 

Then it hit her. Ben. The Taylor Swift song. The whole show she put on for him on the dancefloor. She looked at him horrified again. She covered her mouth but said nothing, trying to hide the fact that memories about last night were already creeping in. 

 

But Ben had felt it. The realization, the shame, the horror. Everything. He looked down and smiled to himself. 

 

"So..." he said not looking at her, "you're a good dancer..."

 

"Oh, fuck," Rey turned to her left again, burying her face in the pillows and covering herself with one of the bedsheets. Ben laughed. 

 

"It's ok! I mean, I'm not a Taylor Swift fan but I can see why you like that song so much. It's catchy... sticky, even," he said thinking how Rey touched herself while mouthing the words to the song last night. 

 

He laughed about it now, but what he didn't say was that image of her contorting her body along to the music was stuck to the back of his eyelids. If it were not for the fact that Rey was sleeping in his bed that morning, that is all he would have thought about during his run. It's all he thought about last night when he returned to his apartment and stroked himself on top of the bed. 

 

"It's my way of releasing stress, ok?" she said peaking behind the sheet. "You go for runs, I go dancing."

 

"Fair enough. Though there're other ways, you know? Like going to the gym or..."

 

"I know. Rose said the same thing, but it's not the same," she said uncovering her face and finally sitting up. 

 

She put the bottle of Gatorade on the nightstand—on the only corner not covered by Ben's books or his phone—and looked at him. He was still standing by the foot of the bed, smiling. But his smile was genuine—not a mocking smirk, but an empathetic pull in the corner of his lips. A little embarrassed, Rey dropped his gaze and looked at her hands. 

 

"Did it work, though?" she said, suddenly, breaking the silence. 

 

"What?" he said confused. 

 

"The dancing," Rey said lifting her face and looking straight at him. "Did it work?"

 

She was not entirely sure about what she was trying to do. The whole scene seemed staged for her to ask that question. There would be no other, more perfect time for them to talk about this. She was ready for something—anything—to happen. Or not. The fight with Poe had given her a sense of instability, the feeling of being suspended in a void where nothing mattered that much. If she regretted something after this, she'd deal with it. She could live with it, she was sure.

 

As soon as he heard the words, he froze in place. He was ready to let what had happened last night slide. Along with that kiss he'd given her on her back that other time. Or her angry pout when she saw him in the club with that other girl. These things—all of these things—were only for him to tease her in the future. They were not supposed to talk about them and, least of all, she was not supposed to be the one to bring them up.

 

"It doesn't matter," he said in a low voice, his body facing her directly. "You're with Dameron. It doesn't matter if it worked or not."

 

Rey held his gaze and furrowed her brow. She knelt on the bed and crawled a little closer to him, leaving the covers behind as she did so. She was only in a white loose tank top knotted at the front, and black panties. Her hair was a mess, but her look was cold and serious. 

 

"That's not what I asked you," she said without blinking. "That's my relationship. Let me worry about it." With her eyes still holding his gaze, she crawled a little closer to him and sat on her heels. "I asked you if it worked," she paused. "Did it?"

 

Ben was towering over her, his pupils moving rapidly from side to side, trying to understand what was going on. Rey was right. Though they were connected by the bond, he was nowhere near knowing everything there was to know about her. Maybe he didn't know anything. This was so off character for her, or at least for the idea of Rey he had in his head. He suddenly felt fascinated by the woman knelt on his bed, by what he felt from her through the bond—she was confident and curious and deadly serious. There was electricity running through her skin, tingling every corner of her. 

 

"Yes, of course it did," he said entranced. 

 

The moment he said the words, Rey stood on the bed. With slow, calculated steps, she walked closer to him until she was only a foot away from him. For the very first time, she was towering over him, her face expressionless looking down on his dark eyes. He held her gaze as she came close to him, his mouth slightly open. 

 

Rey's mind was a total blank, her limbs moved automatically. Without thinking about all the physic laws that had to be broken for her to stand there —in a Manhattan apartment, standing in front of Ben Solo in her panties—she raised her hands to cup his face and, as she did, she bent over and kissed him on the lips. 

 

She exhaled, relieved, as if she had been holding her breath for a long time. His lips were soft and plump and moved in unison with hers—slowly, trying to grasp reality. He closed his eyes and also exhaled deeply through his nose and let himself go. As he did, he grew hungrier and Rey responded pulling him closer, her fingers tangled in his hair, feeling the traces of sweat still there after his morning run. He put his arms around her and lifted her, her legs wrapping around his waist in one swift movement. 

 

They both started panting, craving for air in between kisses, their tongues tangled in their mouths. Doing what he had dreamt of so many times, Ben brushed Rey's lower lip with the tip of his tongue and then sucked on it—first softly, then a little harder before he nibbled it. In a moment of clarity, he let go of her mouth and, still holding her in his arms, pulled his head back to look at her. Rey pulled back too, panting and puzzled, her brow a little furrowed. 

 

"Are you sure about this?" Ben asked looking straight into her eyes. "Don't get me wrong—I really want to do this. But I understand if this was a mistake, and we don't have to ever talk about it again..."

 

"Ben," she interrupted him with a serious tone. "I want to do this. I initiated this because I want to—because I want you," she waited for a second for her words to fully sink in. Then she continued: "If you are worried about Poe, don't. It's not your place. Let me worry about it."

 

"I'm not worried about Dameron," he said furrowing his brow. "I'm worried about you. I'm worried that you may regret this and hate me for it afterward."

 

Rey looked at him and thought he was right to be worried. She may regret this and she may hate him afterward. But it wasn't until she thought about how good it felt to be in his arms that she realized just how much she had wanted to do this all along. She didn't want him to let go of her, to stop touching her. She was sure. Without breaking his gaze, she cupped his face with her hands again. 

 

"I don't want you to stop. I don't want you to stop kissing me, I don't want you to take your hands off me. I want this. Do you want this?"

 

Ben looked at her, mesmerized. 

 

"Yes," he said nodding once, firmly. 

 

She narrowed her eyes and smirked at him: "Then fuck it."

 

He looked at her for a second and kissed her mouth again, hard. Rey ran her fingers through his hair and violently pulled him closer to her. He responded by putting his hands on her ass, his fingers squeezing her. As he did, he sucked on Rey's lower lip and bit it. He did it just hard enough to make her wince, but not hard enough to make it painful. 

 

"I can't tell you how long I've been wanting to do that," he said with a smirk right before he threw her on the bed. 

 

Right before he climbed on the bed, he grabbed his shirt from the back of his neck and pulled it over his head. He shook his hair out of his eyes and looked at her with black hungry eyes. 

 

                                                                           

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, it's happening. 
> 
> Sorry, I still got to learn how to digitize my drawings, but I couldn't help it! <3


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, remember when I said there was going to be some drama? Boom! Drama! 
> 
> And smut—tons of it. 
> 
> DISCLAIMER!! I bluntly and humbly borrowed a line from [Ever-so-Reylo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ever_So_Reylo/pseuds/Ever-so-reylo)'s AMAZING fic ["Head over Feet"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16149329/chapters/37733345), which you should totally check out because it's currently ripping me apart. 
> 
> Please let me know what you think in the comments! 
> 
> Never thought about doing this, but you can find me in [Tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/sandyguts)
> 
> Now, I'm gonna go and try finishing my freaking master's degree—argh
> 
> Love you!

 

"What's up with that shirt?" he asked from his side of the bed.

 

"What's up with my shirt? What do you mean?" she said laying on her back, smiling, the sun from the window reflecting on her skin.

 

"Well, it's not only your shirt. I've seen other girls wear those—the ones that seem to have huge armholes. With no sleeves, obviously."

 

"Oh, you mean the side-boob shirt," she said with a smirk on her face, her eyes hooded. "It's just a sexy shirt but not in a conventional way. You don't show that much cleavage, just a little side boob." She shrugged.

 

"No, I know what those shirts are supposed to do," he said laughing. "I'm a guy. I'm basically the target audience for the side-boob shirt thing. I appreciate it by the way."

 

She laughed.

 

"Then what is the question?" she asked rolling on her side to face him.

 

"That I've seen girls use them as an opportunity to show off lacey bras and stuff. I thought that was the main point. I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm very pro-side-boob," he laughed and rolled his eyes, not even believing those words had just come out of his mouth. "But you didn't do that last night. No lacey bra for you."

 

She laughed again. The whole setting for this conversation—the both of them naked and laying on his bed on a Saturday afternoon—was strange enough that now she had to explain to Ben the concept behind side-boob shirts.

 

"Well, no. I can have the luxury of wearing those with no bra since I happen to have really small breasts, as you have already noticed. So..."

 

"You say that as if you don't like it."

 

Rey took a second to answer.

 

"I don't like it particularly, but it doesn't bother me either," she said looking at the ceiling. "It's just one of those things that if you had had the chance to have a say in it, you would have chosen differently. I'd never get a boob job or anything, but... you know," she said sitting up a little, her weight on her elbow, her head against her knuckles.

 

He looked at her and narrowed his eyes as his gaze went from her face to her chest. He turned on his side to face her, mimicking her pose, and with his free hand, extended his index finger and thumb to place them just below her left breast, lifting it from her rib cage. He grunted and then moved closer to her and licked her nipple with the tip of his tongue. A second later he pulled his head back, blew on Rey's freshly licked nipple, and stared at it as it puckered. From where he was, he looked up at her and smiled.

 

"Your breasts are perfect."

 

She smiled and closed her eyes, pleasure running through her as Ben licked her breast again.

 

It happened so fast, she didn't even notice.

 

She opened her eyes to find herself alone in her apartment. The covers on her bed were cold and in place—no signs of wrestling, no bodily fluids, no smell of Ben. But she felt him in her. Her nipple was still tingling with the touch of his tongue; her cunt still sore from him, from his fingers, his mouth...

 

She felt her heart sink, the crash with reality too hard and too soon for her to handle. She felt like crying. If they lived in the same city, she thought, she would've gotten dressed and run to his place right at that moment. Would he want her to? She didn't know. But the cut in the bond was so abrupt that it left her breathless and wondering if everything that had happened that morning—that afternoon—was actually real.

 

She walked to the bathroom to take a shower but decided against it a minute later. All she had on her was Ben's smell and she wanted to wear it just a little bit longer. Instead, she just laid there on her bed for the rest of the day thinking about him.

 

* * *

 

 

"I can't tell you how long I've been wanting to do that," he said with a smirk right before he threw her on the bed.

 

He stared at her and before he climbed to the bed himself, he grabbed his shirt from the back of his neck and pulled it over his head. He shook his hair out of his eyes and looked at her with black, hungry eyes. She had to make an effort not to let her jaw drop at the sight of him. She knew he was big, but seeing him now she realized she could drown in his chest and die happily squeezed by the power of his arms.

  

He knelt in front of her, his torso straight up, relishing on her gaze. "I had a dream about this," he said in a deep voice. He took her right heel in his hand and lifted it. "I dreamt of kissing your legs..." he said pressing his lips to her ankle, "...and working my way up." he put his hands on her knees and in one swift move, spread her legs apart. Rey took in a deep, loud breath. "You tasted delicious," he said and then slowly kissed both her inner thighs.

 

With each movement, she trembled, pleasantly surprised.

 

"I would like to know if reality is as good as my dreams..." he said lowering himself, his face between her legs, his eyes looking straight at her, "...because if it is..." his thumbs moved up, tracing the crease that separated her legs from her hips "...you're not going to be able to get off this bed in a while," he brushed the tip of his nose up and down her underwear. 

 

Rey watched him entranced. The only thing she could manage to do was to stare at him and either open her mouth a little or bite her lower lip. He relished on her catatonic state, on how she would concede to him—so opposite from the dynamic they've had so far, in which Rey instinctively questioned everything Ben said. But not this time—now she accepted curiously, eagerly. So eager in fact, Rey could feel her panties soaked. At first, she felt utterly self-conscious about it—why was she so willing? So surrendered to him?—but then she realized something. He was there, between her legs, smelling her through the fabric, and she could see it clearly in his face: he liked it.

 

He kept smelling her, and at one point, he grunted, looked at her and licked her. Even if it was through her panties, she felt like a cannonball had just hit her and knocked the breath out of her. It was the first purely sexual thing he had ever done to her and if this was only the beginning, she thought, this would be good. He noticed her reaction and smirked at her, somehow agreeing. He hooked his index fingers to the sides of her underwear to tug them down, but before he did, he looked at her and raised his eyebrows, asking for permission.

 

She was only capable to answer with a quick nod.

 

She could tell how much he was enjoying being in control of the situation and, frankly, she was in too much of a shock to do anything other than watching him. She was frozen in place, but nothing of what was happening—or of what was about to happen—seemed like a bad idea. She had also had dreams about this, but the fact that they were now turning into reality before her eyes, was too much to bear.

 

Ben tugged her underwear down, dropped them on the floor and lowered himself between her legs once more. He dove in, using his hands to keep Rey's hips in place. When his mouth was only an inch away from her, he looked up to meet her gaze. "Hi," he said right before his tongue fell flat on her cunt. Rey's back arched automatically, making her gasp—a scorching, tingling sensation working its way up from between her legs and into every inch of her body. He worked his way around her slit repeatedly and, using his fingers, he split her apart to expose her clit. 

 

Rey had surrendered entirely, and only when it was already happening she realized how long and how much she had wanted it. So she let go, and the sole idea of Ben going down on her was enough to get her halfway there. The other half was being covered by Ben's tongue and the relentless, delicious circles he was drawing around her clit.

 

Using only the very tip of his tongue, he licked and rubbed it, working her up and up, until he noticed her legs were trembling in anticipation. 

 

Then, just as she was about to go over the edge, he stopped.

 

"What? Why did you...?" she said panting, prompted on her elbows, demanding an explanation.

 

"I'm not done yet," he said from between her legs.

 

"What do you mean you're not done? I was about to be done and then you..." she was ready to get into an argument, but then he slid two fingers in her that shut her up immediately.

 

"Why do you want to rush this?" He paused."Do you have somewhere to be? On a Saturday? With a hangover?" he asked at the same time he slid his fingers out slowly.

 

"No... no," Rey said gasping, her eyes closed and her fists grabbing a hold of the sheets.

 

"Neither have I," he said sliding a third finger inside her.

 

It felt delicious and exactly what she needed. The feeling of being filled—of that void being violently replaced by something else—was perfect. Ben kept pumping her with his hand and she would've easily come by that alone, but he had other plans. Just as she was building up again, the muscles in her legs contracting, he started licking her once more—this time, not only with the tip of his tongue but with the full length and width of it. He licked her, sucked her, nibbled her, over and over again. And that was it. As she reached her peak, her back arched in a violent angle and her hips pushed against Ben's fingers, sliding in and out of her faster and faster. She moaned loudly and gasped and as the sensation started to wear off, she opened her eyes and realized Ben's face was no longer between her legs. He was on his knees, in front of her, his fingers still inside, curving. He looked at her twisting and turning in pleasure with a smirk on his face.

 

As Rey was catching her breath, she saw him pull his fingers out and put them in his mouth to taste her. She blushed at how obscene it looked but immediately saved the image as a mental GIF for posterity.

 

"You," he said slowly, as he was crawling over her, "taste really, really good." His face was over hers now and he descended on her to kiss her, letting her taste herself in his mouth. Rey smiled wickedly and kissed him eagerly, hungrily, running her fingers through his dark hair and wrapping her legs around his waist. Ben, who had been hovering over her in a plank-like position, slid his right arm below her waist and moved her swiftly so that in a second they were both on their sides, still kissing desperately.

 

Rey's mouth moved from his lips and traced the line of his jaw, climbing her way up to his ear and the skin behind it. She felt Ben moaning softly when she nibbled his earlobe, but when she sucked on his neck, she felt his skin crawling and his grunt become lower.

 

"You like that, do you?" she said against his skin. He answered with a moan and Rey smiled. 

 

She used her lips to explore Ben's neck. Sometimes she would kiss it softly, testing his patience. Sometimes she'd use the tip of her tongue to draw lines that went from his shoulder to the back of his ears. And when he least expected it, she would suck his skin more violently, thinking she didn't want to leave any marks, but that ship had probably already sailed. He smelled amazing and tasted salty, the sweat from his run still on him.

 

She used Ben's hands and his breathing as a compass to find his weak spots. Right below his ear was a big one—he would grunt deeply and his fingers would dig into Rey's flesh wherever they were—on her breasts, on her ass, on her spine. But the point where his neck met his shoulder—that's was something else. When Rey run her lips there, he would hiss and thrust his hips against her, a low "Fuck" said under his breath.

 

And that did it all for her. Somehow, that word in this context was a trigger for her. It made her wet, it made her anxious, and eager, and ready. She could already feel him hard against her, but her hands had not crossed the barrier of his hips. Suddenly, she pulled her head back a little to look at him. Holding his gaze, she traced her fingers slowly down his spine and felt his skin crawl in response. She was utterly satisfied. When she got to the waistband of his shorts, she hooked her index and middle fingers there and followed the line all the way to the front. She used the back of her fingers to caress the skin on his hips and then slowly slid her hand in between his legs to wrap it around his cock.

 

Ben's mouth opened but didn't make a sound. Rey's mouth opened too as she realized the size of him. She had had the opportunity to experience a decent range of sizes in her life, which had led her to the conclusion that it actually didn't matter that much—she had had lousy sex with guys with big dicks, and really good sex with very average sized guys. But this, this was another ballpark, another sport. The very thought of having Ben's dick stretch her and fill her made her core tingle and her cunt drip. She would not be able to keep this slow pace for much longer.

 

The moment she started to stroke him—slowly, tightly—he moved his hand from her back to her cunt and smiled at her. "You're so wet for me," he said between grunts.

 

"You're so hard for me," she replied biting her lower lip.

 

"Yes," he said. "It's not the first time," he panted in her ear.

 

And that was it.

 

She let go of him and pushed him so that he was laying on his back. She knelt to take his shorts off and at the same time, Ben kicked his shoes and his socks off as well. Once she was done, she moved her right leg over so that her knees were on either side of him, her hips still in the air, not fully straddling him. Holding his gaze, she arched her back a little, took off her shirt and waited for Ben's reaction. His pupils widened, his nostrils flared and his hands, at that point resting on the sides of Rey's knees, slid up her thighs, and up her hips and ribcage to cup both her breasts. Using his index fingers and thumbs, he softly pinched and teased her nipples until they hardened. Rey let her head fall back and enjoyed the touch of Ben's huge hands on her, remembering how many times she had fantasized about this—how many times she had touched herself thinking about his hands.

 

"Ben..." she said rolling her head on her shoulder, opening her eyes. "Do you want to fuck me?"

 

"Yes," he said pinching her nipples a little harder.

 

Rey looked at him and paused, holding his gaze.

 

"How much do you want to fuck me?" she said, her eyes locked with his.

 

"A lot..."

 

As he had started to talk, Rey had lowered her hips and was slowly descending on his cock. None of them made a sound—just the silent hum of air entering through their mouths as Ben got deeper and deeper into her, and Rey stretched wider and wider. After what seemed the longest time, when he was fully inside of her, they both gasped—a low "Oh, fuck..." coming out of his lips; a hissed "My God..." coming out of hers.

 

* * *

 

 

"Did that just happen?" asked Rey panting as she rolled over to the left side of the bed.

 

"Yep," Ben said panting too, his eyes to the ceiling, a hand on his stomach, the other laying lazily by his head.

 

"Oh my God," Rey said putting her hands on her mouth. She stayed there for a second.

 

Ben turned his head to her and watched her quietly, ready for what was to come. But he was wrong—she turned her head to him, her hands still on her mouth as she started to laugh.

 

Ben watched her and laughed nervously.

 

"What's so funny?" he asked, prompting himself on his elbow.

 

"I don't know!" she said laughing hysterically. "No, I mean I do know..." she said calming herself. Once she caught her breath and laughter stopped preventing her from talking, she continued. "It's just weird, don't you think? I mean, I had thought about it but I never thought you and I..." she couldn't finish the sentence.

 

"Would actually do it?"

 

"Yes, exactly that," she replied now turning on her stomach, her eyes still on him.

 

"Well, it's not that weird. I told you I wanted this. I actually thought you'd never go for it... which, by the way, just out of curiosity... why?" he said looking puzzled.

 

"Why what?" said Rey oblivious.

 

"Why did you do this? I mean, I'm single—I don't have anybody keeping tabs on me, but you... you're with somebody and I thought you were pretty serious about it."

 

"I am!"

 

"Rey, seriously?" he said furrowing his brow. "You do see the irony in that, right? In the fact that you're naked, on my bed, and covered in at least three of my bodily fluids, while you say you're really invested in your relationship with another man?"

 

Rey rested her head on the back of her hands and looked at Ben.

 

"I know. Don't take it personally, but I don't really feel like talking about it right now," she said in a calm tone. "Things are... confusing these days and I... I think I just needed this. Is that ok?"

 

"Yeah, sure," he said, a tinge of disappointment in his voice. "I know I'm not the first person you'd think about for something like this, but if you need to talk about it... I won't judge you." He laid back and put his hands behind his head. "I have my share of mistakes under my belt so I could never judge you."

 

Rey looked at him for a moment, her eyes soft. "That's really nice, Ben. Thank you."

 

"Any time."

 

* * *

 

Rey doesn't remember what they were talking about but, at one point, she closed her eyes and fell asleep. Minutes later she opened them again to find herself laying on her back, the weight of half of Ben's body on top of her. He was asleep too, his head resting between her breast and her shoulder, his arm around her and his left leg tangled up with hers.

 

She was startled at the level of intimacy of the situation, but quickly realized she didn't feel uncomfortable at all. She put her arms around him, one hand resting on his shoulder, the other one on his head, her fingers playing softly with his hair.

 

As she did this, he moaned softly in his sleep and squeezed her tightly. She looked at him, smiled and went back to sleep.

 

* * *

 

 

Rey's cunt was already sore by then, but when he started kissing the skin on her stomach, she felt it just didn't matter. She moaned a little and her fingers made their way through his hair again.

 

He was on top of her, nibbling her hips, kissing her belly and the skin right below her breasts.

 

"I want to fuck you again," he said lifting his gaze to meet hers. "Can I fuck you again?"

 

He had no idea what that word did to her. Fuck.

 

She started conjugating the verb in her head.

 

He has fucked me.

 

He wants to fuck me.

 

Ben fucked me.

 

Ben Solo is fucking me.

 

She smiled and moaned a little louder this time. "Well, you already stated I have nothing to do on a Saturday, with a hangover, so if you have better plans..."

 

"I do," he said, now moving upwards. "The best plans." He said this right before putting one of Rey's breasts into his mouth and sucking on her nipple.

 

She hissed a little, closed her fist in Ben's hair and threw her head back.

 

Before long he was on top of her, making his way into her, carefully. She gasped and opened her eyes to watch his face as he penetrated her once more. He held her gaze, his mouth a little open, the corner of his lips curling up into a smile.

 

"You feel so good," he said when he entered her completely.

 

"You fuck me so good," she said closing her eyes and throwing her head back once again.

 

"I've only just started..." he replied before he began thrusting harder and harder into her.

 

* * *

 

Just as Rey was raising her head to look at him—both palms on his chest and her chin resting in the back of her hands—Ben thought he'd have an aneurysm. 

 

"Wait, what?" he said squinting. 

 

"I like Muse, but I don't like Radiohead," she said matter-of-factly. 

 

Ben looked at her for a second, his mouth gaping a little bit. He had one arm behind his head, the other one on Rey's back. 

 

"That doesn't make any sense," he said furrowing his brow. 

 

"Why not?"

 

"Because Radiohead precedes Muse. They laid the foundations for Muse's sound in the late 90s and early 2000s—everybody knows that!" he said, his eyes widening. 

 

"So?"

 

"So you liking Muse but not appreciating Radiohead, is like you liking ketchup but not tomatoes!"

 

"Does ketchup have any tomato in it nowadays?"

 

"No, it doesn't—it's all artificial flavors and sugar and shit," he said in a single breath. "But you're missing the point here." He was starting to get a little exasperated, and Rey really enjoyed this new side of him—Ben, the music snob. She went along with it. 

 

"What's the point, then?" she said smirking. 

 

"The point is, Muse is a cheap, slightly less depressing copy of Radiohead, which not only makes it worse than Radiohead but actually makes it impossible or at least irrational for somebody to like one and not appreciate the other."

 

"Ok, that's not fair. They do have a sound of their own, at least until  _Drones_ , which is when it all went to shit..."

 

"Thank you!" he interrupted. 

 

"But—but I never said I didn't appreciate Radiohead. I do. I have tons of friends who love them and have spent years trying to convert me into a fan," she said raising her chin a little so she could talk. "And I know they're good and super influential and all of it. But I just don't like them! Something's just not there!"

 

"Oh, but there is something about Muse..." he said mockingly.

 

"Yes, yes! As a matter of fact, there is!" she said sliding to his left, her weight on her elbow. "Their use of synths, the presence of classical and chamber music, the themes of conspiranoia, war, technology..."

 

"Oh my God..." Ben said frustrated, covering his face with the palms of his hands. 

 

"Look, I'm not trying to convert you," she said laughing. "I'm just trying to tell you that there is space for people like you in this world, and for people like me. And maybe one day, not far down the road, we will share music and find something that we both enjoy and be happy about," she said very calmly, almost mockingly. 

 

Ben squinted at her. "Since when are you in such a conciliatory mood?"

 

Rey smiled and repositioned herself, placing her head right between Ben's chest and shoulder. 

 

"Maybe it's because I just got laid," she said giggling. "But regarding music, well, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree," she said, her smile so wide he could hear it in her voice. 

 

Ben grunted as he lifted his left arm and put it around Rey. She closed her eyes and relished on just how comfortable she was—how his temperature was just right, the weight of his arm just enough to make her feel a little confined and guarded. Plus, she had easily found that sweet spot—the hollow in Ben's chest where her head fitted perfectly and in the exact angle.

 

She opened her eyes and watched as Ben's chest raised and fell with every breath he took, the beating of his heart encompassing the movement.

 

Neither of them slept. They just stayed there for a while, in silence, while Ben's thumb stroke Rey's arm lazily. 

 

* * *

 

 

"Your breasts are perfect," he said and then took her nipple between his lips again and licked.

 

She smiled and closed her eyes as her skin rippled.

 

It happened very fast and suddenly. Ben fell through, his head hitting the mattress in the spot where Rey's body used to be only a second ago.

 

"Fuck, no..." he said, looking for her everywhere, confused.

 

But she was nowhere to be found. The bond was cut and all he had left was Rey's void—the wrinkles in her side of the bed, her smell on the pillows... and her clothes.

 

He stretched to reach for his phone on the nightstand. He needed to talk to her, even if it wasn't in person—did the bond count as "in person"?—even if it was through text only. He couldn't sit around and wait for her to appear again out of thin air, so he unlocked his phone, opened Facebook and typed in her name.

 

Once he hit "Search", he got five results for "Rey Johnson" and prepared to assess them one by one in order to find her. The first one was blonde and skinnier than Rey. The second one had long black hair and the third one just didn't look anything like her.

 

Fourth Rey's face was too small on her profile picture for him to discard, so he tapped her name and opened up her profile. Once the image loaded, he expanded it with his fingers and sighed. There, standing in the top of a mountain, in what looked like a state of infinite bliss, Rey smiled widely back at Ben, a hand in the air, the other one around Dameron's shoulders.

 

Something in his stomach churned. He pressed the home button twice and quickly jerked his thumb up to toss the app into oblivion.

 

Ben sat on his bed in silence for a minute and, understanding how stupid it was, placed his hand on the wrinkles Rey's body had left on the sheets. The spot was still warm. Ben closed his eyes and allowed himself a minute to feel the void trying to suck in his sternum. Then he opened his eyes, stood up, put his phone on the nightstand, and pulled the sheets from the bed. He rolled them all into themselves—the top and the bottom, the pillowcases—and threw them all in the hamper with the rest of the laundry.

 

He then turned on the shower and let the scorching water hit his head and back. His skin turned red and a cloud of steam swallowed him whole. That was the only way, he thought, he'd get Rey's smell off of him.

 

 


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey people! Long time, no see!
> 
> So yeah, I'm kinda the worst, but I was stuck finishing my degree and then graduation and all of that, and on top of it, I was dealing with a little bit of an emotional bump that I hope I'm over, but you never know when those creepy fuckers come back, right?
> 
> Anyway, I left things off on a bit of a cliffhanger last time and now, considering it took me the longest time to update, I thought you deserved two chapters for the price of one. Sweet, uh? Hope you enjoy it! 
> 
> Again, thank you to everyone who's reading and leaving kudos, but especially to those taking the time to leave a comment! Your good vibes and love are always the best fuel for creativity, so if you have ideas, (constructive) suggestions or just want to giggle at how much you're enjoying this, please leave a comment! 
> 
> My funemployed ass would really appreciate it! :)
> 
> Song for this chapter
> 
> Disclosure - ["Help me lose my mind"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HS2hspTsTl8)
> 
> UPDATE: Hey, so I fucked up and posted this chapter twice. Oops! When I said "two chapters for the price of one," I meant we get separate Rey and Ben scenes here. Thank you to [Popitsryry](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Popitsryry) for letting me know!

 

It was already dark outside when Rey realized she was still naked, laying on top of the bed, staring at nothing in particular. She had spent all afternoon in a catatonic state, trying to figure out what had happened that day, unable to make any sense of it.

She knew herself. She thought the guilt would overcome her and she'd regret everything by the time evening came. Instead, she found herself giggling at the memory of laying on Ben's bed that morning, relishing on the mental images of what they had done. 

There was still a bittersweet taste lingering in her mouth, though. The end of it had come so suddenly it had taken her breath away. It was taking her the whole afternoon to get it back. She had thought of reaching out to Ben online, texting something in the lines of "I didn't want that to end. What do we do about it?" but she knew it would complicate things. Right now, her whole body felt like a livewire and anything she did—anything at all—could have the most disastrous consequences.

She'd have to stay silent. Give it a couple of days. Wait until her hands stop twitching, searching for skin.

And then there was the thing about Poe. What will she do about Poe? Her demeanor became somber.

Finn's advice was simple: it was either in or out. If she slept with Ben and realized it was just sex—that there was nothing more to it—she would not feel guilty about it and could resume her life like nothing ever happened. It would be done.  _Boom_. Gone. But if instead, things turned out to be more complicated than that, then she'd have to be honest about it. To Poe, of course, but mostly to herself. 

The problem was even she wasn't sure which of these two realities she was living in now. 

Rey looked at herself and decided she could no longer stand the sight of her own naked body. Her skin kept reminding her where Ben's hands and lips had been, and guilt had started creeping in from deep within her. She stood up and searched for her pajamas below the pillow. She put it on, closed the curtains in her bedroom and then sat down on the edge of the bed, petrified.

The initial plan was to get it out of her system, the feud with Poe being the perfect excuse to do it. She would not get attached—it would just be sex and she'd be done with it. That was the plan. That was  _always_  the plan. But was it? In the darkness of her room, with the remnants of Ben's scent still on her, she had to admit it—the plan was always a no go. She could never treat Ben as some guy she met in a club and decided to sleep with after a few beers. He could not be erased so easily. He was more than that. How much more, Rey still didn't know—but she did know he meant enough for her to be certain she had to stop it.

The sound of the entrance door shutting startled her. She held her breath as she felt Poe's footsteps approaching the bedroom. He pushed the door open, turned on the lights, and furrowed his brow as he saw Rey sitting at the edge of the bed, her back to him.

"Hey," he said dropping his duffle bag on the floor. "What are you doing sitting in the dark?"

"I fell asleep," she said looking over her shoulder. "I just woke up a couple of minutes ago." Her voice was bleak, her face expressionless.

"Oh, I see," he said picking his duffle bag again and putting it on the bed. He opened it and started to get his clothes out and putting them away in the closet. "I ran into Rose a couple of days ago. She played it really nonchalant, but I could tell she knew about our fight and all. She was dying to ask me how I was doing."

Rey turned around to face him and looked at him in silence. She was baffled by the familiarity with which Poe put away his clothes as if nothing had happened—as he hadn't spent a week sleeping somewhere else and this was the first she'd heard of him during that time. She furrowed her brow at the scene, still saying nothing until Poe caught her eye.

"Baby, listen," he said as he dropped the shirt he was holding and walked around the bed to sit beside her. He took one of her hands and cupped her face with the other. "I don't want to fight anymore. I don't want us to be mad at each other. This is stupid! I spent a week away and I felt miserable every day to the point I forgot what we were fighting about!"

Rey lifted her eyes to look at him and inhaled deeply, trying to interrupt. He didn't let her and just held her gaze intently, ignoring how her mouth soundlessly opened. 

"I'm so sorry. I'm sorry—I was stupid. I said terrible things, but I didn't mean any of it," he said. 

"Poe..." she managed to whisper. 

"Can't we just get past this? I love you and I'm tired of being angry. I don't want this anymore," he said ignoring her, the words coming out of his mouth stumbling into one another. "We don't even have to talk about it if you don't want to—"

"Poe..." she said louder this time.

"Rey, please," he insisted not even noticing she had spoken. "I know you're still pissed and I know I'm no easy guy to deal with—you're no piece of cake either! But I want to try and try again, and again if necessary. I missed you and I just want to get back to normal. Let's just pretend this never happened—"

"Poe," she said more forcefully this time, her fingers wrapped around his wrist and dropping his hand from her face. 

Startled, Poe finally shut up. His eyes were locked on her face, his mouth open and waiting to keep talking. 

Rey pressed her lips into a line and gathered all the strength she had to hold his gaze. 

"We need to talk."

 

* * *

 

 "Hey, where's your bathroom?" Hux asked.

"Enter the bedroom and then to your right," Ben said from the kitchen. 

A couple of social events and a handful of meetings with potential investors—"Rich guys desperately wanting to be the next George Soros," Ben had told him—had made Hux fly in from the West Coast for a couple of days. When work was over and there were no more hands to shake, he and Ben went for a couple of drinks to catch up. Of course, with Hux a couple of drinks quickly turned into a bottle of whatever the trend was that month. After they had gone through almost three-quarters of a very expensive Japanese whiskey—the current trend—and invited for drinks a couple of girls who turned out to be "too giggly" for Ben's taste, the men called it a night and went back to his place to have a final beer. 

Ben sat on his couch drinking from his bottle as he waited for Hux to be back. He suddenly felt very tired and decided he'd grant himself an extra half hour of sleep the next morning to make up for it. As he was wondering if he had any early meetings the next day that interfered with his plans, Hux came out of his bedroom with Rey's Chucks dangling from his index and middle fingers. 

Ben froze mid-thought, the beer bottle's mouth resting idly on his lower lip, his eyes on the worn out shoes. His gaze then darted to Hux's face, who grinned widely at him mockingly. 

"So..." he said laughing, "...seems like your feet have reduced in size since I last saw you." 

"Those are not mine," Ben managed to say before taking a gulp of beer. 

Hux narrowed his eyes and dropped the shoes by the bedroom door. "No shit, Solo..." he said taking the bottle already waiting for him on the coffee table and sitting on the couch in front of him. "Of course I understand these are not yours! Who's the girl?"

"No one, just some girl I picked up at a bar the other night," Ben said very nonchalantly. 

"And this girl managed to float all the way back to her place or did she bring a spare pair of shoes solely for the purpose of going back home?" Hux asked sitting back on the couch. 

Ben stared at him for a couple of seconds trying to figure out a possible explanation, but he couldn't. He was usually a no-bullshit kind of guy, never apologizing for what he did, say or think. This was the reason he had never bothered to develop the intricate skill of lying. Now he couldn't regret it more. But even if he did know how to bullshit his way through life, this was too strange a situation to lie his way out of it. 

The only reasonable explanation for Rey's shoes to be in his apartment was that he was seeing her steadily—Hux would never believe he allowed a girl he was only seeing casually to leave anything behind at his place—and then the floodgates to a major inquiry would open, making him produce more and more lies. It was a trap. 

Seeing how his friend's jaw tensed at his question, Hux took pity on him and interrupted the silence. 

"All right, you don't have to tell me who she is or what is the current situation or anything," he said. "I can see you all worked up about it and though I'm enjoying it, it makes me sad to torture you."

"Thanks," Ben said sighing in relief, thinking that was the end of it. 

"Are you happy, though?" Hux asked suddenly. 

"What...?" 

"Are you happy? With this mystery girl? Is you not talking about her some kind of way not to jinx it or something?" 

"No," Ben said smiling nervously, his head down. 

"So you're not happy..." Hux said cocking his head and furrowing his brow, trying to understand. 

"No! No, I am!" Ben said, his head darting upwards. "I mean no, it's not about jinxing anything. It's just that this whole deal is a little bit complicated." He leaned back and sighed. 

"How so?"

"Well, for starters, she has a boyfriend."

"Like a recent asshole boyfriend or like she's-living-with-the-guy-and-she's-about-to-marry-him kind of boyfriend?"

"More like the second," Ben said taking a sip of his beer.

"Uhh... shit! How and why did you get tangled up in that?" Hux said with a grimace. "Is she like very hot or...?"

Ben's brow furrowed deeply at Hux's last question but relaxed as he realized there was no malice in it. 

"Well, she is, actually, but it's not just about that..." Just as he said this, he realized that even though he was talking to a friend, he was not at all comfortable with the amount of information he was disclosing. He interrupted himself, looked at Hux and cleared his throat. "Anyway, it was more of a physical thing at first and I didn't think she'd go for it because of the whole boyfriend thing. But then she did, and I thought that would be that, and..."

"And now she's leaving her stuff at your place," Hux said nodding. 

Lacking a better metaphor for the whirlwind of a mindfuck he was going through after that Saturday he slept with Rey, he decided that was pretty spot on and decided to run with it. 

"Exactly," he said leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees. 

"So she's in," Hux said.

"What do you mean she's in?"

"Well, if she's deliberately leaving stuff at your place it's because she's in. She likes you, right?"

Ben's lips turned into a straight line and his eyes darted to the ceiling, again confronted with the reality that this was much more complicated to explain than what Hux implied.

"Let me guess," Hux interrupted his thoughts. "It's complicated."

"Yep," Ben said sipping his beer. 

After a moment of silence in which Hux decided his inquiry was over, Ben dropped his head a little, letting his hair hide his eyes. 

"It doesn't matter anyway," he said bitterly. "She's not gonna leave her boyfriend, so I'll just make peace with the fact that it was a one-time thing and be done with it," he paused. "Fuck it," he straightened up and took a gulp to finish his beer. "Apparently, I'll just have to fuck my way out of this," he said laughing. 

Hux joined him in his laughter. 

"To be honest, you don't sound so convinced, Solo."

"Do I have a choice?" he said laying back and raising the empty bottle still in his hand. 

"Yeah, apparently not. Cheers to that," Hux said grinning, raising his own bottle. "Well, don't worry, there's plenty of fish out there and maybe you need to take a break from New York girls."

"What do you mean? Do you want me to go all the way to Jersey to meet somebody?" Ben said laughing.

"No, asshole," Hux said smiling. "I need you to come west for a couple of weeks. The financial team there is struggling a little and I feel they need to be shaken up a bit. They could use some of your subtlety."

Ben's eyes grew wide and for a second he felt his stomach rise to his throat. "I thought Phasma had things in order," he managed to say as he leaned forward. "At least that was my impression."

"Yeah, she does, but you know they're not doing as well as your East Coast team, and if we want to reach this year's growth projections, we need to keep the money rolling in," he took a big gulp of his beer, finishing it. "We can't have one of our engines running at half capacity. Not now," he said putting the bottle down on the table. 

Ben laid back on the couch, crossed his legs and spread his arm over the headrest. 

"Phasma's gonna be pissed," he said grinning. 

"Dude, I know. But again, it'll be good to shake things up a little bit. Keep people on their toes."

"Right," Ben said looking through the terrace door at the Manhattan skyline. "When do you need me in San Francisco?"

"Monday," Hux raised to his feet looking at his phone as he requested an Uber to take him back to his hotel. "And don't worry—you'll have plenty of time to forget about Miss Chuck Taylors over there. I'll make sure of it," he said with a wink. 

Ben scoffed out a laugh. 

"Yeah, right."

 

 


	13. Chapter 13

As Rey rode the elevator up to the 5th floor, a little void started surging in the pit of her stomach. She knew that once she opened the door, she would be walking into her apartment—not  _their_ apartment. She could imagine the main things that would be missing, but she feared for the things she couldn't even imagine—the things Poe had brought to their house and had become such an intimate part of her life, that she might have forgotten they were never actually hers.

 

Poe had insisted on coming while she was at work to pick up his stuff and move out. He didn't have much, so a day would be more than enough he had told her. Still, the mere possibility of running into him in the middle of that process was too much, so she asked Finn to join her for dinner and a drink after work.

 

_"What?" Poe said as her confession punched all the air out of his lungs._

_"There's somebody else," she repeated, her own words tearing her apart._

_He sat there, dumbfounded, not being able to believe what Rey was telling him. It had only been a week. How was it possible for her to meet somebody else? For it to be so important as to break them off?_

_Poe stared at her for what seemed like hours._

 

When Finn had said his goodbyes and in a last desperate attempt to stall the inevitable, she decided to walk home even though she was a good three miles away. But an hour later, when her building had finally materialized in front of her, she realized there was no point in postponing it.

 

The elevator doors opened and she felt her palms sweating. She walked to her front door—the only thing separating her from her decisions—and as she turned the knob, panic ensued.

 

The apartment was dark and quiet, but she could already tell the little differences. She switched the lights on and saw Poe's keys hanging by the door. Though they were not exactly his anymore, since he had taken the Lego minifigure keychain she always liked so much. She turned to the living room and saw the bookshelves were emptier. He had taken his books, his records and that vintage record player he spent so much money restoring.

 

In the kitchen, most of the appliances were gone. Poe liked to cook and had always been baffled by how poorly equipped Rey's kitchen was, so he took it upon himself to fix that. Gone were the set of good knives, the blender, and even the soupmaker Rey enjoyed so much during the winter. She immediately made a mental note to buy one for herself.

 

The closet was almost deserted. Most of the space was used by Poe and his "cool vintage jackets." Most of them were not cool at all, but they were gone now. The bathroom was also deserted. She realized she finally had all the space she had wanted for her stuff—perfume, makeup, those seemingly amazing face masks Rose keeps telling her to put on on Sundays. But she literally has one lipstick, a concealer, a dried up mascara, and one bottle of perfume she rarely wears. And as much as she has told Rose how good those masks are and how great her skin looks since she started using them, she has not been able to bother to go into Sephora and actually purchase one. Not once. What was the point of having all that space then?

 

_"I'm sorry," Rey said, sobbing. "I didn't plan this, but it happened and it's been on my mind for a while and it's just way too much... I... I can't keep doing this. I'm sorry."_

_Poe lowered his gaze and noticed his hands were still holding hers. Automatically, he let go of them, as if suddenly her touch were burning his skin. He looked in her eyes again, his brow furrowing, his mouth gaping._

_"I loved you. We were happy... how could you do this?" he said, his voice a monotone._

_Rey could barely look at him but understood she had to. This was the least she could do. She owed him this—to be brave, not make excuses for herself, to look him in the eye, and tell him the truth._

 

Rey threw herself on her bed feeling the void taking over her insides. Had she made a mistake? Maybe she should not have told Poe. Maybe she should have waited. Maybe she could have been able to carry on as if nothing happened. Maybe she would have forgotten about him. But just as she thought about him—about Ben—she knew she was making excuses for herself yet again. Forgetting about Ben was inconceivable, least of all considering she has not been able to stop thinking about him since Saturday.

 

She had thought sleeping with him would make the dreams go away, that it would be like a valve releasing all the pressure she had felt building for months inside her. But it made it worse. Now she dreams of him every night, and flashes of him come back to her every time she closes her eyes looking for concentration. She started to remember things her brain had secretly stored in GIF format and were only now coming to the surface. 

 

The way his hair kept covering his eyes while he thrust into her, and the little jerk he'd made to push it aside. 

 

The way he looked from the bed while he stood in front of her, his chest heaving. 

 

His lips becoming a line as she approached a sensitive spot in his body.

 

_At one point Poe stood up and started pacing the room asking questions. No, he wasn't from work. No, he didn't know him. Yes, she had slept with him. No, it only happened once._

_"Does he love you?" he asked._

_Rey opened her mouth and realized she didn't know the answer to that._

_"No," she said. "As far as I know, no." She looked down at her hands. She was deeply concentrated in her own fingers intertwining when she heard Poe's final question._

_"Do you love him?"_

 

Rey shook her head, eaten up by guilt—here she laid, mourning the end of her relationship with Poe while fantasizing about the man she cheated on him with. She sure was a piece of work. But even though she felt like shit about it, guilt had actually reminded her she had made the right decision. Whatever she felt about Ben she would have to figure out, but doing it while being in a relationship with Poe was definitely unsustainable.

 

Now, what to do about Ben? That she didn't know. It had been almost a week since everything happened and the bond had not bothered to bring them together again. She wanted to see him, touch him again and do everything they did again, and possibly more. But did he want the same? Was he as pleased as she was with what had happened or would he be back to his old, cold self? She was always talking about him being something to get off her system, but what if that is exactly what she was for him? The thought of being discarded like that by him was too much to bear.

 

_Rey looked at him, not sure of what to say. The immediate answer to that question was "No," but saying only that would be a lie. No, she didn't love Ben, but she cared for him, wanted to know him, desired him. How could she say that to Poe without hurting him? Without hurting him even more than she already was?_

_"No," she said finally, looking down. "But he's been on my mind... too much. More than I want him to be, and..."_

_Poe's eyes started filling with tears but he looked determined in not letting them fall down his face._

_"...it doesn't feel fair..." she said._

_"Nothing about this feels fair!" he interrupted her._

Laying on her bed, staring at the ceiling, Rey realized she was about to lose everything. 

 

She had made her decision and even though she was not proud of what she'd done, she knew at the end telling Poe the truth and letting him go was the right thing to do. She had lost him—the price she had to pay in order to explore the possibility that was Ben.

 

But she could very well lose Ben too—even though she doesn't have any claim to him; even though he has never been hers to lose.

 

She curled up in a ball and started crying, feeling the weight of loneliness burying her deep in her own bed. 

 

What the fuck had she done?

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, the angst! 
> 
> Guess you really can't have your cake and eat it too! 
> 
> Wanna talk some more? Please, step into my office (AKA [Tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/sandyguts))
> 
> Thank you for reading/commenting/leaving kudos! You guys are the best! <3


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know [this song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qanl1s7K2Kc) doesn't apply to this particular situation, but I had it playing in my head while writing this chapter.

Rey was starting season four of "Parks and Recreation" —a rewatch— when her phone buzzed on the floor.

 

 **Finn** :  _Hey hun! Rose and I are going to get a late lunch at that place the hipsters at the office are raving about. Wanna join?_

 _  
_ She looked at the screen with the side of her eye, not even bothering to fully turn her head or even attempting to actually grab her phone. Laying on the couch, her laptop over her legs, she ignored Finn's text, and hit the space bar to continue watching.

 

A couple of minutes later her phone buzzed again.

 

 **Finn** :  _Don't think for a second I don't know you're ignoring me! I know you can't stand to leave your phone in the other room._

 _  
_**Finn** :  _Hey, listen, it's ok. I know you're going through a process and everything but it's been a week and I still don't even know what happened._

 _  
_**Finn** : _Shit, you don't even have to talk about it! I'm just worried for you, hun._

 ** _  
_ Finn**:  _It'd be great if you could join us._

 ** _  
_ Finn**:  _Text me if you change your mind._

 _  
_**Finn** :  _Luv ya!_

 _  
_ With the same disregard as before, Rey glanced at the screen as the texts were coming in. She didn't feel she deserved a late lunch or even going out unless strictly necessary, for that matter. Since the day she had come back to her apartment to find Poe's things gone, she had been relentlessly punishing herself. Anything that sounded like fun she avoided, any indulgence denied.

 

She barely talked during working hours and went straight home afterward. Her only outing was on Thursday when she ran out of clean underwear and she forced herself to go down to the laundromat right next door to her building. She didn't get ice cream while she waited as she always did, though. She just alternated between staring at her clothes going round and round in the machine, and the Korean soap opera playing on the TV in the corner. It had no subtitles.

 

This was her own way of dealing with her new opinion of herself. Rey knew it wasn't healthy and that she'd eventually have to quit it. But not yet. She had judged people for way less than this and now it was her turn. She could be a tough judge, too.

 

At one point she thought it would all be better if she could talk to someone about Ben. She had thought about talking to Finn about it but realized it would be too complicated. There would always be the question of "What now?" that she'd have to answer with a "I don't know, he lives in the other side of the country and we haven't even been in the same room together." That'd be hard to explain.

 

She also thought about talking to Ben. Maybe everything would be better if she could hear his opinion—if she could know what he thought about what happened and she didn't have to guess. Maybe he'd have something to say to make things better. But then again, what was an indulgence if not that? She felt she didn't deserve to talk to him and probably Ben was not interested in talking to her about it. Now that he had already slept with her, he probably was no longer curious. He probably didn't want her anymore.

 

Rey shook her head and pressed the space bar to resume the show and braced herself for another day of staying in.

 

A couple of hours later, just when Rey was realizing how ironic it was to watch the episode in which Leslie Knope has to face trial over her relationship with Ben (seriously?), and ends up suspended from her job, there's a knock on the door. It was obviously Finn coming to get her out of the house at whatever cost, Rey thought. She laid there, motionless. Eventually, Finn would get tired and go home. But just as she was bracing herself from some shouting coming from the hallway ("Rey of fucking sunshine! It's time to go outside! Open the door!") she heard another knock.

 

Knowing this level of politeness was not Finn's style, she put the laptop on the coffee table and walked to the door. When she opened, she saw the broad back of a tall man in a black t-shirt walking away toward the elevator. He certainly had noticed the sound of the door, because before she could tentatively say his name, he turned around to look at her.

 

"Hey, I thought nobody was home so I was just about to..." Ben trailed off. "You look awful, is everything ok?"

 

Stunned, Rey looked at him and realized in a second she could either burst into tears right then and there, or she could burst out laughing. She went for the latter.

 

"Of course I do!" she said bending herself forward.

 

Ben, now fully turned to her, looked at Rey quizzically, trying to understand a joke he obviously missed.

 

"I'm sorry! I don't know why I'm laughing, really!" she said when she could finally catch her breath.

 

"Neither do I," said Ben raising an eyebrow.

 

"Sorry... come in," she said taking a step back and opening the door further. "I can't believe the bond left you on the other side of the door. That's a first!"

 

"Actually," he said as he walked past her, "I'm here."

 

"Yeah, I can see that," she said closing the door behind her and internally panicking for the state her apartment was in. It was obvious she'd been here in hiding for way too long.

 

"No," he said turning to see her. "I am _here_. In San Francisco."

 

She looked at him, her brow furrowed, her lips pouting slightly in disbelief.

 

"You mean you are..."

 

"Here—physically here. This is not a bond thing," Ben said and then pursed his lips.

 

"H-how, why...?"

 

"Well, you see, there're these things called planes, and they're really fun because you can buy a ticket and actually fly wherever you want to go..."

 

"I know how travel works, Ben," Rey interrupted him a little exasperated. "I meant why are you... _here_?" She moved toward him and without looking him in the eye, brushed the tips of her fingers on his forearm. "It feels... different," she mouthed to herself.

 

"Oh, work trip," he said matter of factly. "Had to come for some meetings and stuff so I took off a couple of days earlier to explore the city before it gets too busy."

 

"Right. Work trip," she said looking at the floor, slight disappointment in her voice. "How did you find my place?" she said walking past him and sitting on the couch.

 

"Well, even if I haven't  _been_  here before, I've already been here before. I knew where your building was so I only had to find your apartment number. One of your neighbors —Mrs. Reed, I guess was her name?—gave it to me pretty easily. You should talk to her about that," he said smirking.

 

She scoffed and then smiled.

 

"So much for security..."

 

Ben smiled at her in silence. She laughed nervously, looking at him and back to her hands, not knowing what to do.

 

"I brought your things back," he said interrupting the silence and reaching into the bag he had dropped on the floor. He pulled out Rey's clothes and her Chuck Taylors. "Except for that wedding you went to, I've never seen you in anything but these shoes. I thought you might miss them."

 

"Oh, finally! I haven't been able to leave the house! I have no other shoes, you see..." she said smiling and taking the clothes from him. She noticed there was a particular item missing, but she didn't say anything. "Thank you. I already bought another pair, though. I figured it was a sign."

 

"Yeah... These have seen better days. I'm surprised you didn't buy a new pair earlier."

 

"Well, I kinda get attached to them, you know?" she said going to her room to leave the clothes. "It's like they've been places with you and I feel bad throwing them away."

 

She stepped back into the living room and sat on the couch. She smiled nervously and rubbed her hands on her thighs, covered in grey sweatpants. She stared at him, not being able to believe he was actually there.

 

"So..." he said after a minute, "you look like shit."

 

Rey furrowed her brow, a little offended. "Excuse me?"

 

"No, sorry!" Ben said suddenly realizing how she had heard what he said. "No, that's not what I meant! I mean you look tired... or sad... or both," he laughed at his own stupidity. "Is everything all right?"

 

"Oh... is that obvious, uh?" she looked at him and he nodded. "Poe left."

 

Ben sat up straight, a little dumbstruck. "Oh..." he pressed his lips together and swallowed. "I'm sorry, I didn't know... I thought it was something else..."

 

"Yeah, well... remember I told you we were at a weird spot him and me?"

 

He nodded.

 

"Well... there you go," Rey said with a self-deprecating smile that faded rapidly from her face.

 

Ben sat there not sure of what to say.

 

"Was it because of..." he started saying without thinking, "I mean did you... tell him...?"

 

"About what happened?

 

He nodded.

 

"Yeah, but before you can start feeling guilty about it, I have to tell you this is not about you," she said, her words a little more caustic than she intended. "What happened between you and me, that was a symptom of something else, something that had a long time coming." Ben nodded again in silence. "So don't worry, or feel guilty or sorry for me, ok?"

 

"I wasn't..." he almost mumbled.

 

"Good."

 

Rey thought it necessary to put that barrier there, to make sure he didn't think she was crazy enough to break up with a serious boyfriend because of that one time they slept together. In his head, she thought, this could all be just something that happened—a one-time thing, as she had expected it to be. To tell Ben it was impossible for her to be in a relationship with Poe when he roamed her head day and night—his face, his smell, everything he did to her that weekend—would have been too much. Too needy, too intense. Too much of a hazard.

 

They both sat there in silence again. Rey staring at the floor, Ben looking at the zig-zag line at the point where his fingers intertwined.

 

"Do you want to talk about it...?" he ventured without looking up.

 

"No," she said drily, jerking her head to look at him. "I'd rather not," she corrected herself, a little sweeter this time. "But thank you."

 

"That's all right," he said grinning, this time lifting his head to look at her.

 

Another minute of silence went by. This was starting to feel more and more like a routine.

 

"Well," he said putting his hands on his thighs and standing up, "I need to eat."

 

She stood up as well. "Oh, there's a lovely Chinese restaurant a couple of blocks down south that you'd surely love."

 

"Ok, let's go," he said turning towards the door.

 

"What do you mean 'let's go'?"

 

"I mean grab your stuff and let's go," he said turning around toward her. "I won't even insist on you changing into proper pants. I know in New York people try to avoid eating out in sweatpants, but I'm no expert on west coast etiquette, so I'll give you the benefit of the doubt."

 

"I-I only meant it as a recommendation... I actually don't feel like going out..." Rey smiled apologetically.

 

"Oh, no," he said taking a step closer to her. "We're going. It's not good for you to stay inside all the time, we're not even going to be that far away. Plus, you need to eat anyway, so..."

 

"Yeah, I just don't want to go out," Rey said, firmer this time.

 

Ben looked at her with his eyebrows raised.

 

"Ok, we'll order in. You have a menu? I'm sure I saw a couple on your fridge the other day..." pointing with his thumb toward the kitchen.

 

Rey was dumbfounded. She did not expect her day to go this way. She was supposed to be finishing season four of "Parks and Recreation" by now, and not talking to anybody. Least of all Ben.

 

"Do you want me to go look for the menu? Or maybe we can order on GrubHub, I'm sure your Chinese place is on there," he said getting his phone out of his back pocket and unblocking it before he sat on the couch again.

 

She continued to look at him in awe. Ben had no intention of leaving her alone. And it was not even him asking her if he could stay—least of all demanding it. It was just him staying with her as it were a fact, a decision in which she had no say. This was against everything she had planned for herself that weekend, but she realized she really liked this turn of events. She didn't have to make much of an effort to go along with it.

 

"Ok, let's go," she said moving toward the door.

 

She heard Ben stand up behind her and follow her out. 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! 
> 
> Thank you for sticking to this fic! I really appreciate your kudos, comments and basically your time :)
> 
> I'm sorry it's been so long since the last update but I'm getting a little lost and I'm having a hard time trying to figure out where to take this. I actually still don't know but hopefully will come up with a plan. 
> 
> Thank you again for reading! <3


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Remember me? Yeah, I'm the worst, I know!
> 
> To say things have been going crazy lately is more than an understatement. 
> 
> Anyway, here's another chapter of this humble attempt of a fic. 
> 
> Hope you guys enjoy! 
> 
> Once again, thank so much for your kudos and comments! They mean the world to me <3

Ben kept looking to his side to see if she was still there. Since she reluctantly left her apartment with him, he feared it would take her a second to sneak out and disappear. Maybe it was because he was used to that, but he reminded himself that this was not a bond thing. That he was here, with her. That every time they bumped into each other in the crowded street, it was his actual body reacting to her—not his mind, not his emotions. 

 

Rey walked by his side but always seemed to be dragged along. She’d not said anything since they came out of the elevator in her building, and her eyes were glued to the floor, her gaze lost. He wanted to get her talking but didn’t know how. He thought once she started, it would be easier for him to steer her in another direction, to something more cheerful, less self-destructing. He even thought of saying something stupid and mean to get her angry. He knew angry-Rey, he could handle her. This? This was different, more delicate. And he felt big and clumsy, scared that in trying to cheer her up, he’d break her.  

 

As they walked, he constantly debated between the instinct to hold her and make her feel ok, and the impulse to slap her out of it. None of the options seemed like a good idea, so he did nothing and kept on walking. 

 

Once at the restaurant, they sat on a table for two by the window. Ben opened the menu, took a look at it and then lifted his face to look at Rey — her eyes were lost in the street. Without thinking too much and still holding the menu in his hands, he snapped it closed loudly. She jolted, the sudden sound bringing her back to reality. 

 

“So,” Ben said looking at her as she turned to him and sat back on her chair, “you know this place better than I do. What’s good?”

 

“Ahm…” she said a little confused. She suddenly realized how little she knew about him. She didn’t even know if Ben was a picky eater. Or a vegetarian. Or a vegan. Or maybe one of those people who chose to eat gluten-free even though they don’t even know what celiac disease is. “What do you like?”

 

“I don’t know. I’m easy. I eat everything,” Ben said matter-of-factly.

 

“Like, everything? What about tamarind chicken? They have a great…”

 

“Is that sweet?” he interrupted her. 

 

“Uhm… yeah, why?”

 

“No.”

 

“What do you mean ‘no’?” said Rey furrowing her brow. 

 

“I don’t do sweet.” He shrugged. 

 

Rey’s eyes widened in disbelief. “You _don’t_ do sweet…?” 

 

“I mean, yeah, I do sweet, but for things that are supposed to be sweet,” he said, trying to sound rational. 

 

“Like dessert?”

 

“Yeah, like dessert. That sweet I’m ok with.”

 

“Ok…” said Rey rolling her eyes. Without even asking him, she raised her hand and asked the waiter for two orders of dumplings and two beers. The waiter nodded and she rested her hands on the edge of the table. She looked at Ben and cocked her head. 

 

“Who decides what’s supposed to be sweet or not?” she asked. 

 

“What do you mean?” 

 

“I mean, who decides desserts are supposed to be sweet and chicken is supposed to be savory? Both can be sweet and savory, and equally good.”

 

“Tradition? Common sense? I don’t know. I’ve never liked the combination. It’s either this or that,” Ben said. “I remember the first time my mom ordered Hawaiian pizza for us. The one with pineapple?” Rey nodded. “I was about 8 and she explained to me that if I liked pizza and liked pineapple —which I do— it would be almost a sure thing that I’d like pineapple on my pizza. But guess what?”

 

“Worst fucking thing you’d ever had?” Rey asked resting her chin on her hand. 

 

“Worst. Fucking. Thing. I’ve. Ever. Had.” he said this emphasizing every word with his hands. He understood he was telling the most superfluous, boring story ever, but he could see Rey coming back little by little. When she actually laughed at his words, he knew he should keep going. “Whoever thought of that? It’s disgusting!”

 

“But what about salted caramel?” asked Rey, suddenly very interested. 

 

“What about it?”

 

“Well, that’s kind of the opposite—something that’s supposed to be sweet but is actually savory.  And, I don’t think I have to work too hard to make the case of salted caramel being far more superior than regular caramel,” Rey said while unwrapping her chopsticks. 

 

“Oh no…”

 

“You’re seriously going to argue with me on this one?”

 

“Oh, you bet your ass I will…” Ben said grabbing the edge of the table in a feigned gesture of impatience. “Salted caramel is a cacophony of flavors… it is way too much—too sweet, too salty.” Rey raised her eyebrows as high as they would go, the expression the same as if someone had insulted her and her entire progeny. 

 

“Oh my God, I can’t even believe I’m having this conversation…” Rey said holding her head with both hands as the waiter came back with their beers and dumplings. “Salted caramel is glorious. The fact that it is intense in both sweetness and saltiness, is what actually makes it amazing.” 

 

Ben shook his head as his lips tightened in a line while his big hands rubbed his chopsticks against each other. 

 

“No. This will not stand,” Rey said decisively. Just as Ben was about to interrupt her, she shushed him and continued. “I’ll tell you what, Solo—make sure you leave some room for dessert because, after this, I’m going to take you to a place where they sell the best salted caramel ice-cream ever. You’re going to have some, and you’re going to love it.”

 

Ben grinned at her. Rey was back. 

 

“I don’t know…” he said teasing. “You’re not the first who’s tried to convert me.”

 

“Listen, I feel this is my calling. This explains everything,” she said laughing at her own exaggeration. “This is the purpose of our bond — right here, right this moment. We are bonded so I can show you how good salted caramel can be! It all makes sense now! It’s the only explanation!”

 

Ben picked up a dumpling and dipped it in soy sauce. “It’s the only explanation,” he said smiling before putting the dumpling in his mouth. 

 

“Well,” he tried to say, food still in his mouth. He swallowed. “If we’d known that, maybe we could have saved ourselves some time…”

 

“Two years, exactly,” said Rey before putting a dumpling in her mouth.

 

“Shit, really? Two years already?” 

 

Rey chewed and nodded. 

 

“I appeared in that apartment in Brooklyn you used to live in with your roommate… what was her name?” she said after she swallowed. 

 

“Bazine,” Ben said. 

 

“That’s right! That super model-slash-influencer-slash-film-director. I remember you were talking on the phone with her about how you thought _La La Land_ was better than you’d expected— “

 

“In spite of the dancing,” Ben said before having a sip of his beer. 

 

“That’s right,” Rey smiled. “And then you lost your shit.” 

 

“Well, in my defense,” he put his beer down, “wouldn’t you lose your shit if you thought you were by yourself in your apartment and suddenly you turned around and you saw a complete stranger?”

 

“But I was just as lost as you were! It’s not like I was holding a knife at you or anything…”

 

“No, you held one of my boots at me,” he said smirking. 

 

“Well, it was the only thing I could grab and since your feet are so damn big, if thrown correctly, it would’ve made enough damage for me to sneak out of there.”

 

Ben snorted and laughed. She followed. 

 

A minute later, when Ben had chewed and swallowed his third dumpling, he looked at Rey and cocked his head to the side. 

 

“Why do you think this happened to us?” he asked. 

 

“The bond, you mean?” 

 

He nodded. 

 

“I don’t know. Sometimes I feel it’s because of loneliness…”

 

That answer caught him off guard. 

 

“Loneliness?” Ben asked as his brow furrowed, the rim of his beer bottle resting on his lower lip. 

 

“Yeah…” she said crossing his arms on the table. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. I’m lucky — I have tons of friends;  great, amazing friends who care for me, and support me, and would go to great lengths for me to be happy,” she said in a single breath. Then she sighed. “But sometimes I feel like I’m alone. I won’t go into that now, but I didn’t have the best childhood, and I always felt like I was being left behind… an afterthought. Sometimes I think that feeling just stuck with me and I can’t shake it. At first, I thought that was what the bond was for — to fill the void that, at that point, I thought was just a part of me.”

 

Ben looked at her mesmerized, thinking this was not the answer he had imagined when he asked the question. He didn’t see something so honest and intimate coming, but now it was there, and somehow he felt happy she’d trust him enough to tell him all of this. 

 

“And has it?” he swallowed nervously, “Fill the void, I mean?”

 

Rey smiled sweetly and looked out the window. 

 

“In a way. I mean, before I thought I was inherently alone. As if someone had dropped me on earth by myself. But now… this thing we have… it’s mine. It’s yours too, but it’s mine and I love to have something that’s mine, you know?” she shrugged and smiled. “Does it make any sense?”

 

Ben had a gulp of his beer and squinted his eyes as he looked at the people walking down the street through the window. He took a minute to think of his answer. 

 

“It does... loneliness,” he finally said. “As a kid, I think I felt the same way. My parents weren’t around that much. They were always busy doing their own thing…” he paused and then continued. “I feel I might have had to grow up a little too quickly in order to handle that. I understood more things that kids my age did, and I think that made everything… hurt a little more? I don’t know…” he shook his head nervously and took another sip of his beer, suddenly a little uncomfortable with how much of himself he had let her see. 

 

“Hey,” she said, smiling and reaching over the table to hold the hand he had left there. “You’re not alone.”

 

He could feel a different kind of electricity now, the difference between touching through the bond and touching in real life evident in the tingling he felt wherever their skins connected. 

 

“Neither are you,” he said, squeezing her hand softly. 

 

They stayed like that for a second and looked at each other. Ben had been in this kind of situation before and always had felt a little uneasy about holding a woman’s gaze after a conversation like that. But somehow this felt different — a lot more natural. The moment could have lasted an entire minute and he wouldn’t have been the wiser. 

 

“So,” she said suddenly, the tingling turning into a kind of itch the second she let go of his hand. “I’m on a mission here, and I’m nothing if not persistent.” She raised her arm and asked for the check. 

 

“Are you going to make me eat salted caramel, Rey?”

 

“No,” she said, leaning over the table. “I’m going to change your life.”

 

He grinned and as soon as the waiter left the check on the table, Ben snatched it, put his card in it and gave it back. The waiter left and Rey smiled at him, her elbows resting on the table. 

 

“Thank you, Ben,” she said. 

 

“Don’t thank me. You’re going to buy me salted caramel ice-cream, remember? I might give it a try, but I’m not paying for it if you’re the one on a mission to convince me not to hate it.”

 

Rey looked down and smiled wider. Then she looked up to meet Ben’s gaze. 

 

“No, not for the dumplings. Thank you for this — dragging me out of my apartment, making me laugh. I really appreciate it.”

 

“Sure thing,” he said, his lips tugging at one side of his face. 

 

Then the waiter was back with Ben’s card. He signed the receipt, put the card away in his wallet and slapped his hands against his lap. 

 

“Are you ready to have your life changed?” Rey said as she stood up. 

 

Ben looked up at her and grinned once again. 

 

“I’m ready.”

  
  



	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!
> 
> Welcome to another episode of "I'm sorry I haven't updated this fic, please don't hate me!" I'm so glad you guys are still with me on this and to make up for lost time, I bring you an extra-long chapter. 
> 
> We're hitting the home stretch here, so buckle up. 
> 
> Things in the personal world have started to slow down a bit, so I'm gonna try to be more consistent with updates. 
> 
> I added a little reference to one of my favorite fics these days [KyloTrashForever](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KyloTrashForever/pseuds/KyloTrashForever)'s _[I Caught Fire](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19582582/chapters/46488088)_ which you should totally check out because, oh my, the angst is real. See if you can find it :)
> 
> I love where this story is going and hopefully, you will too. Thank you again for all the kudos and comments and general love you send my way! I really do appreciate it.

It hits him like a punch in the chest. The sweetness. It’s too much. It’s as if all the nerve endings in his mouth lit up at the same time—overstimulated, buzzing with sugar. He winces and moves his tongue to accommodate the sensation, to make it a little more soothing, but it is pointless. As he moves his jaw, he runs into something else. A rock, a crystal. He bites into it and the explosion happens all over again, only this time, the taste is abrasively salty. There’s a tingling in his tongue, on the roof of his mouth, he just cannot get used to. He swallows quickly hoping to make it go away, but it lingers for a moment. 

 

His brow is furrowed and his face turned into a grimace. He looks down and sees her, waiting, expectant. Her eyes are glistening with excitement, waiting to see if she was right, wanting to be responsible for presenting him something so spectacular that he’ll love forever. For a moment he considers this and thinks about lying, of telling her he loved it, that she was right all along—to let her have this win. But then he bites into another salt crystal still roaming in his mouth and he cannot help but wince once again. 

 

“Yeah, no,” he says giving the spoon back to the lady behind the counter. 

 

“What do you mean ‘no’?” Rey says, her expression a mix of disappointed and appalled.

 

“No, salted caramel is definitely not for me,” Ben says to her, shrugging his shoulders. “Can I try the pistachio one, please?” he says to the lady behind the counter. 

 

Rey looks at him, gaping.

 

“I cannot believe this. Salted caramel is amazing, everyone loves it, Ben!” a shiver goes up his spine when he hears her say his name. He tries to ignore it. “What didn’t you like about it? Ah? The perfect sweetness? The counterbalance of the salt? The little chunks of caramel that explode in your mouth like the most delightful surprise?”

 

“It’s just way too much. I felt all of the taste buds in my mouth stand up at once, too much information to be processed—” he says as the lady behind the counter—who’s not a lady, but a highly tattooed twenty-something with a smirk on her face, both bored and charmed by this conversation—hands him a little spoon of pistachio ice cream. “—Thank you.”

 

He puts just the tip of the spoon in his mouth and hums.

 

“This, on the other hand, is amazing. Just perfect,” he says this offering the spoon to Rey, who’s looking at him with a deep crease between her brows and her lower lip pouting out as if she were a second away from a temper tantrum. He smiles at her, triumphant, realizing just how much he loves to make her angry because that means he’ll get to soothe her afterward. “Don’t be such a baby. I bet you love pistachio ice cream just the same.”

 

She frowns again but takes the spoon into her mouth. The second her lips close on it, Ben cannot help but wonder if this is too intimate—if this is what he’s supposed to be doing. He suddenly remembers Rey’s mood when they came out of her apartment to get something to eat, and though it had changed and she was laughing and joking now, he didn’t want to test his own luck and have her running in the opposite direction. But maybe she forgot or she’s just playing along, because she doesn’t seem to notice, doesn’t seem uncomfortable with him feeding her ice cream in a public place, in her hometown, with a line of strangers behind them praying to God they would take their intimacy someplace else and let them have their damn ice cream. 

 

“It’s ok, I guess,” Rey says rolling her eyes, trying to disguise how much she liked it. Ben relishes on his victory. 

 

“I’ll have a cone with a scoop of pistachio, please,” Ben says to the lady behind the counter. 

 

“And I’ll have a cone and two scoops—one salted caramel and one pistachio, please,” Rey says, not even looking at Ben.    

“Well, look who changed her mind,” Ben says, a smirk on his face. 

 

“In case you didn’t hear, I’m still having salted caramel, so I haven’t changed my mind,” she says, smirking back at him. 

 

They walk to the register and Rey pulls out her wallet—a plastic iridescent thing she probably got from Forever 21—and gives the cashier her card. 

 

“A cone with two scoops, please,” she says to her, and Ben looks at her, surprised.  

“I got dinner. Thought we agreed ice cream was on you.”

 

“Well, yes, but I specifically said I’d buy you salted caramel ice cream. Since you’re so reluctant to try it, then I guess you’re paying for your own cone, aren’t you?” Rey says, a bigger smirk on her face now. 

 

“You’re unbelievable…” he says getting his wallet from his back pocket. 

 

“I’m kidding of course! It’s not your fault you’re so flawed you cannot enjoy salted caramel,” she laughs and turns to the cashier again. “And a cone with one scoop, please.”

 

When they come out of the shop, they walk for a couple of blocks, both of them too invested in their own cones to make conversation. Ben is methodical with his ice cream. He always has been. He likes to use one of those tiny plastic spatulas to smooth the surface, and then eats whatever is left on it. It allows him to savor it slowly. 

 

When they reach a corner and the light turns red, he looks at Rey and sees her struggling with her two scoops. She licks one side of the cone as she realizes there’s ice cream dripping on the other side as well. When it’s too much, she puts her lips on it and sucks lightly. He starts to remember things, his mind pushing play to the supercut of that afternoon a couple of weeks ago. But before he’s lost in it, he remembers Rey in her grey sweatpants and messy bun, and how she’d been so defensive earlier. He decides it's better not to go there and he directs his gaze to the other side of the street. 

 

They resume walking and enter a park. They find a bench and eat their ice cream in silence while they watch people go by. The sun is setting. 

 

“So,” she says without looking at him. “What was it like when you were a kid?”

 

He looks at her, his eyebrows raised, and then he snorts. “What’s up with  _ that _ ?” he laughs. 

 

She smiles, looking coy. “I don’t know. I realized earlier I don’t know you that much, and you mentioned that about being lonely growing up… so I wondered…” she shrugs. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to…”

 

Normally he didn’t like to talk about these things. He has a weird relationship with his parents and his childhood doesn’t sprout what you’d call happy memories. But he rarely has this level of intimacy with anybody, and somehow, this afternoon—just like the one a couple of weeks ago—seems a bit different. He knows that if he can talk to someone about this, that someone is her. 

 

“No, it’s ok,” he says squinting at the sun. “I’m just wondering how much time you have…” He smiles, still not looking at her. 

 

“I have nowhere to go,” she says putting her leg on the bench and turning to him. 

 

He looks at her and smiles. Then, as if gathering strength, he sighs. 

 

“Well… I grew up in New York. First in the city and then I moved with my parents upstate when I was about 14, which is basically the worst age to start living in the suburbs once you’re used to Manhattan.”

 

“Why did you move then?”

 

“My parents were going through some shit. They never really got along, or maybe they did, but in a very particular way. I guess the fighting was just a thing they did… part of their dynamic as a couple or something. I don’t know,” Ben paused to scoop some ice cream into his mouth. He swallowed and continued. “But it started getting out of hand and this time it actually looked like it was serious—that they would actually get a divorce. They decided to leave our apartment in the Upper West and move upstate, to a big house with a backyard and all that. I don’t know why…”

 

“Maybe they thought a slow-paced life would be better,” Rey says and takes a bite from her cone. 

 

“Maybe. Don’t know why they thought that would help though,” he says squinting to the sun again. 

 

“So? Did it work?” 

 

“Nope,” Ben says, licking a drop of melted ice cream off his cone. “In fact, it kind of made us all drift apart a little. My dad had his business in the city—sketchy stuff I never fully understood, probably because I knew I didn’t want to know—so most of the times he ended up spending the night in the city and he didn’t come home at all,” he takes a bite off his cone. “My mom resented that, not only because the whole point of moving was to have more family time, but because she had put her career on hold to move upstate. She was growing restless.” He looks at her and her gaze is glued to him, waiting for more. “My mom is not the kind of person who can just sit around and do nothing.”

 

“What does she do?”

 

“She’s in... public service,” he says evading her eyes. 

 

“What does that mean? Is she in politics or something?”

 

“Kind of… yeah,” Ben says reluctantly. “She’s a senator.”

 

“Oh, shit! Really?” Rey jolts in excitement, and then quickly backtracks. “Wait, is she a Republican?”

 

“Oh, God, no…” he says laughing. “She’d die before that. She’s a full-on Democrat.”

 

“Good… I thought that’s why you were so wary about saying what she did for a living.”

 

“No, it’s not that,” he says, still smiling. “But being the son of a senator has its downside. Everyone thinks I am where I am at professionally because of her, not because of my own work and that’s just… bullshit,” he says, frowning. 

 

“I get it. You don’t have to tell me who she is. Although I must say I probably don’t know her...”

 

“Oh, I bet you do. She’s not one to keep a low profile.” 

 

“What? She’s like a Leia Organa kind of senator?” she teases. 

 

“She’s exactly like Leia Organa,” he says with a scoff. 

 

“Oh, shit!” she says covering her mouth, her eyebrows shooting up. “Are you telling me you’re Leia Organa’s son? As in senator Leia Organa is your mom?”

 

“Yep. That’s exactly right,” he bites his cone. 

 

“Oh my God, I love her! I even signed a petition for her presidential candidacy! She’s a badass!”

 

“I know. And I’m really proud of her. But in politics, in order to be a badass, you have to spend a lot of time campaigning, and meeting people, and shaking hands, and traveling…”

 

“...and being away from you,” she interrupts him. 

 

“That’s right,” he says, giving up on the tiny spatula and licking his ice cream. He doesn’t miss Rey’s eyes lingering on him. He enjoys it. “When we lived in the city it wasn’t that bad. I think I had more distractions then, though I still barely saw my parents. But when we moved upstate, things got worse. My dad wasn’t around, and my mom was around at first, but then she started working again and ended up not coming home for days at a time. And I didn’t have much else to do, so I started doing stupid shit and getting angry all the time. Very angry.”

 

“You were mad at your parents?” she asks seriously, her eyes fixed on him.

 

“Yeah, I was. A lot. I just felt I hadn’t asked to be in the middle of all of that. They should’ve known better than to have a son when they were not prepared to actually spend time with him.” 

 

Every time he talks about this, his mood gets somber and the anger comes back. Therapy, and multiple conversations and screaming matches with both of his parents have helped him cope and get over most of his feelings of abandonment. But the anger is never truly gone. He is about to go into this all-too-known vortex of his when she interrupts him. 

 

“So you started to wear a lot of black, and pierced stuff, right?” she asks with a smirk.

 

He bursts out laughing, grateful for the lifeline she’d just thrown his way. 

 

“Exactly. Yes,” he says laughing. “That’s how I dealt with it. Lots of eyeliner too.”

 

“No way. Seriously?” she asks in disbelief. 

 

“Yep. I was a full emo kid back then. I even pierced my own lip.”

 

“No, you didn’t,” Rey is now sitting cross-legged on the bench, looking at him intently. 

 

“Yeah, I did. See that little scar under my lip?” he moves a little closer to her, biting his lip to show her. She cups his face with her right hand and moves her thumb over the little white scar under his lower lip, almost imperceptible to the untrained eye. He welcomes her touch.

 

“Oh, yeah… I see it now. But wait—you have two. One bigger than the other.”

 

“Well, it's called a spider bite piercing. I did the first one myself and of course, it got infected. That’s the big one,” he says grinning at her. “The little one was properly done. With sterile equipment and a guy who knew his stuff. That one healed much better.” 

 

“See this?” she says pointing to a tiny scar on her left nostril, getting even closer to Ben. “I had the great idea of piercing my own nose with a wool needle.”

 

Ben takes her chin and moves her face to get a better look at it. Of course, he had already seen the tiny scar, but when he is presented with an excuse to touch her, he takes it. 

 

“I thought that was just a zit,” he says joking. 

 

She laughs, shakes her head to break free from his fingers, and punches him on the shoulder. 

 

“Asshole!”

 

“Ouch…” he says playfully. “That’s badass, by the way. Didn’t your nose get infected or something?”

 

“Yeah, of course, it did!” she says. “But I couldn’t afford to have my nose pierced by a professional, so I just stuck it out. Salt and alcohol did the trick. Hurt like a motherfucker, though.”

 

“It sounds like it,” he says eating the last bite from his cone. Rey’s is long gone.

 

A moment passes and Rey’s gaze is lost in the horizon, the rays of the dying sun shining through the trees. Ben stares at her, thinking how sunlight suits her. It had suited her that morning when she woke up in his bed with a hangover. It suits her right now, the orange glow making her auburn hair look even warmer. She suddenly notices he's staring and she turns to look at him. He thinks she’d feel self-conscious and is ready to apologize, but she smiles, a sweetness in her eyes he’d gladly let saturate all of him.  

 

“Come on,” she says jumping to her feet and jerking her head. “Let’s get out of here before it gets dark.”

 

Without a word, he stands up and walks slowly beside her. He follows her through the park, still saying nothing, trusting she knows where she is going. A moment passes by, and maybe it’s because he’s growing restless from the silence, or maybe because he suddenly realizes he wants to know everything about her, but he can’t help looking at her and ask: 

 

“So, how were things when you were a kid?”

 

Her reaction to the question is not as light as his had been earlier. She looks down and smiles sadly to the floor. 

 

“Are you really up for that kind of story right now?”

 

He looks at her puzzled, suddenly realizing this is not easy for her. 

 

“You don’t have to tell me, really… I just thought…”

 

“It was a bit rough,” she interrupts him, lifting her face to look in front of her. “I grew up in foster care, so things changed a lot.”

 

He was not expecting this. When she had mentioned she had a difficult childhood earlier, he thought it was the classic rough childhood—divorce, neglectful parents, maybe some drugs. But this—he was not imagining this. He wants to ask her why. Wants to ask her where her parents went, whether she found a home where they cared for her. The instinct to hold her is there again, but he can see she is having a hard time speaking as it is. If he touches her, he thinks, she will dissipate into billions of molecules and out of his reach forever.  

 

“Money was scarce and sometimes I didn’t end up in the best homes,” she turns to him and sees the horror in his eyes. “But I managed. I got out, went to college, made a good life for myself,” she says defensively again. 

 

After a moment, when it’s clear she won’t say more about it, Ben looks up and realizes they are not in the park anymore. They must be back in Rey’s neighborhood, because blocks start to look familiar. 

 

They keep walking and a couple of streets later, he breaks the silence: “I’m sorry I made you uncomfortable. I shouldn’t have asked…”

 

“It’s ok,” she says not looking at him, still walking. “You didn’t know and I asked first so… In a way, I think I started it.”

 

“Anyway… I’m sorry.”

 

“About what?” she says coming to a halt and turning to look at him. “Are you sorry you asked or are you sorry about what I went through? Because, thank you, but I don’t need you to be sorry. I’m in a better place now…” she is saying all of this in a single breath when Ben interrupts her. 

 

“Hey, hey… stop it,” he says soothingly, putting his hands on her shoulders. She looks at him with rage, as if his touch is a transgression of her space. But he doesn’t move an inch. “I get it, and it’s ok. I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable and I don’t want you to talk about things you don’t want to talk about. It’s ok.”

 

“No, Ben,” she says shrugging his hands off of her, “you don’t get it. You looked at me with that same look everyone has when they hear my story. They pity me. They feel sorry for me. And I hate it. I don’t need that. I can fend for myself, I’ve done it all my life. I don’t need pity. Not from you.”

 

“I do not doubt it for a second. That you’re strong, and tough, and can perfectly fend for yourself. Fuck, I don’t know if I’d had the strength to come as far as you have. But allow me to be horrified, Rey. I just spent God knows how long venting about my mom and my dad and their divorce, while for you the words ‘tough childhood’ mean a whole other thing. And it makes me feel like shit…”

 

“It wasn’t my intention to…”

 

“I know it wasn’t. I’m not saying that...” he sighs and looks at her again. “Look, I do not pity you. I don’t know your whole story and I won’t ask for it if you don’t want to tell me, but whatever it is, you’ve come a long way and I admire you for that. That’s it. That’s all there is to it. You’re amazing and I’m sorry you had to go through that because you don't deserve it.”

 

He doesn’t realize he is breathing heavily until he’s finished talking. He purses his lips and flares his nostrils, trying to calm himself. Rey is standing in front of him, staring, her mouth gaping. 

 

“Thank you,” she says finally. 

 

He nods, not knowing what else to do. In other circumstances he would hold her, tell her she will never be alone again, nuzzle her neck and kiss her. God, he wants to kiss her. But everything still feels too new, too fragile. He doesn’t want to scare her away. So he stands there still, trying to calm his breathing.  

 

“This is me,” she says after a moment. Ben looks around and realizes they had been outside Rey’s apartment building all along. 

 

“Of course,” he says. 

 

“Thank you for today. I had a great time and I really needed that.”

 

“I had a great time too,” he says, his hands in his pockets, his shoulders shrugged. “I’m just gonna call an Uber to get back to my hotel…”

 

“I can wait with you if you want...”

 

“No, don’t worry. I’ll be fine,” he says getting his phone out of his back pocket. 

 

“Ok, sure. Goodnight, Ben,” she says turning toward the building’s entrance, her eyes never leaving him. 

 

“Goodnight, Rey,” he says smiling, his phone on his hand. 

 

He watches her get into the building and then turns to the screen.

 

For whatever reason, the app keeps loading and “connecting him with nearby drivers,” but even after a few minutes pass, nothing happens. He grunts, displeased. He closes the app and opens it again, and in doing so, he sees a red dot over the Facebook app. 

 

He really hates it. He should’ve deleted it long ago, but occasionally he finds it useful, so he decided to keep it, all notifications muted. But he’s been too lazy to deactivate the numbered red dots, and his OCD just won’t allow him to have any red dots on his home screen. He taps the icon and almost jolts in surprise—there is a friend request from Rey Johnson. He taps on the “Accept” button and instinctively turns to look up at the building, only to find Rey's head popping out the 5th-floor window. 

His phone buzzes in his hand. 

 

Rey:  _ Wanna come up? _

 

He looks up again, but it is too dark to see if she’s smiling or not. He nods and starts typing. 

 

Ben:  _ Yes.  _

 

Rey’s head disappears and a moment later, the main door of the building buzzes open. Ben puts his phone in his back pocket and enters. 


End file.
